Refuge
by binkeybella
Summary: An on-going series of one-shots and story arcs revolving around Tony as he takes 'refuge' on the old, plaid couch parked in Gibbs' basement. AU and probably OOC, no slash. F/S
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I have decided to pretty much write any new stories as AU - therefore, some characters will probably seem OOC at times. Truth be told, I'm tired of the canon characters and the way they behave, so I'm going a different route for a while.**

* * *

Gibbs had been surprised to hear the knock on his door at 1700 on a Friday night, and even more surprised to find Tobias Fornell standing on the other side of it with a bag of take-out in his hand. Gibbs's team had been off rotation for a few days following a long, well-fought case, of which Fornell had battled tooth and nail at the beginning of for territorial rights. He had lost, and in the end, it had been in everyone's best interest that the premier MCRT had been the ones to investigate it, and he was determined to take the high road and prove to his friend he didn't hold a grudge about it.

"Brought calzones and wings. Ya got some beer?" Fornell asked, holding up the large white bag.

Gibbs swung his arm out to gesture the man into the house, and they settled in the dining room for their feast.

"Where's DiNutso, figured he'd be here grilling a steak for a victory dinner."

"He and Abs and Kate went out to see some band they all like over in Georgetown. He'll probably stay over at Abby's place."

"I think it's nice he spends time here. Place looks better since he got here. Not so…Spartan."

"Yeah, s'pose so. Told 'im he could bring in a few things, didn't figure he was plannin' on redecorating the whole place."

"Don't call a few pieces of furniture and a new flat screen redecorating, but, whatever. Oh, by the way, I got a couch out in my truck. I was gonna ask you if you wanted, it's been in the basement gathering dust since Diane left, gonna take it to the thrift shop if you don't want it."

"Already _got _a couch, Tobias."

"This one's nicer, newer. Not so plaid."

"I like plaid."

"Yes. So say your sports coats. Take a look at it before you say no."

Gibbs took a huge bite of his calzone and got up from the table.

"You won't shut up and let me eat in peace till I do, so I'll take a look from the door," he grumbled around the calzone. Being as fond of food as he was, Fornell spoke fluent 'mouthful', and followed the man out of the dining room.

"I think you'll really like it once you see it, and we can unload it when we're done eating."

"Where the hell would I put the one I _got?"_

"We can take _that _one to the thrift shop instead!"

"No," Gibbs snapped, leading Fornell to believe the old sofa had some sort of sentimental value. "It stays here."

"You buy it when Shannon was-"

"No. It just stays here. I take your couch, you help me put it somewhere else."

"Like...where, exactly?" Fornell stood looking around the small living room already filled with furniture and an entertainment center.

"I dunno, Tobias, but it's not going out of here for a long time, so we'd better figure it out. And I'm not takin' the thing if it's broken down or stiff as a board. I know Diane's taste in furniture. If it was stylish, it didn't matter if your ass felt like it was sitting on a pile of concrete."

"It's not, Jethro, it's very comfortable. I debated keeping it myself, but it would remind me too much of the old days lookin' at it. Just take my word for it and take the thing."

"Fine," Gibbs agreed, shoveling in another mouthful of calzone, and taking a slug of beer. "We'll clear out a spot down cellar and put the plaid one down there."

"Hey, great idea, you won't need to keep sleeping in under the boat!"

"Nah, I'll still sleep under the boat. Just help me get it down there; it's where it needs to be."

"Whatever, Jethro, as long as we can get it down there without breaking our idiot necks in the process."

"We'll manage, we're not that useless yet. Once we get it started down the stairs, we just turn the end around and tip it down off the staircase. I'll grab it from the floor and ease it down, you come down the stairs and pull the other end off. It'll be simple."

**. . . . .**

Many swearwords and a few bruised shins later, Gibbs and Fornell had both couches situated where their own wanted them, and they settled in the living room for one quick beer to whet their thirsts, stripped down to their t-shirts and damp with sweat.

"Yeah, yer right, this _is _nice, Tobias. I think Tony'll like it, it's sure long enough for him."

"He complain about the other one?"

"Nope. Doesn't complain about much of _anything _here except not enough hot water for a shower. I keep tellin' him if rolled out of the sack a little earlier he'd get first dibs at it. Stays up too late watchin' his movies."

"Can't begrudge him that, Jethro. He could be spendin' that time at a bar across town."

"I don't begrudge him anything, Tobias, he puts in his twelve hours, sometimes more, he should be able to spend his free time however he wants."

"But you like that he spends most of it here," Fornell grinned, knowing how much Gibbs enjoyed having Tony's company even though he would never admit it out loud, and maybe even to himself.

"Don't have to worry about 'im so much that way. Kid's a shit magnet, nothin' saying it won't follow him home from work."

"Whatever you say, Jethro," Fornell smirked, setting down his empty beer bottle on a cork coaster. "Gonna head out before it gets dark. Thanks for the beer."

"Yeah, Tobias, thanks for dinner and the couch. Kate and Ducky will be thrilled, they'll think I finally found some taste somewhere."

"Not a chance, Jethro. See ya next week."

Gibbs tipped his beer towards the man and Fornell let himself out, chuckling to himself about his friend's newest rescue project. For all his growling and gruffness, LJ Gibbs had found room in his guarded heart for his Senior Field Agent, and had made it his second job to watch out for the young man, surprising anyone and everyone who knew Gibbs. But surprisingly enough, DiNozzo balked at the extra care and attention, never having much lavished on him at any time in his life, except perhaps the years before his mother's death. And while he never dared flat-out defy the older man, especially when he was under his roof, he still shied away from any show of fondness other than an occasional head slap or, in weaker moments, an affectionate tousle of his hair. Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo would have been perfectly happy to lay his life on the line for his boss, but to accept the fact that he had real worth to the man outside of his hot shot job skills was beyond his comprehension.

Gibbs hoped that one day he could get through to Tony, though at the moment he wasn't really holding his breath. He gathered up the beer bottles and rinsed them out for recycle, took a quick shower and changed clothes, then headed back down to his basement to spend some quality time with some bourbon and boat building. Finding the stress of the week catching up with him not very much later, he took a few minutes to relax under the vessel's ribs.

He found himself awakened, many _hours_later by someone banging around in his kitchen. He checked his watch, saw the sun creeping through the shrubs outside his window, and let his nose guide him up the basement stairs to the brewing coffee.

He found, as he had suspected, Tony in his kitchen, making eggs and frying some ham, efficiently as ever, but with a bit more emphasis than normal. Maybe he and Abby had had some sort of problem.

"You get in a fight with Abby?"

"Nope. Abby and I are fine. She's gone shopping somewhere with Kate."

"Then why all the extra noise?"

"No reason." Tony's answer was sincere, but his tone belied it, and Gibbs knew better than to believe him.

"Something Kate or I said? 'Cause I know the past week we got a little sideways with ya..."

"I'm used to that and I know neither one of you really mean anything by it. Doesn't mean I like it, though."

Hmmm. Maybe now they were getting somewhere.

"You never stop us, Tony, makes it too easy for us to get away with."

"So it's _my _fault you guys snark at me?"

"Tony," Gibbs prodded gently. "Tell me what's _really _got you so worked up."

Tony knew that anything Gibbs told him to do without a question mark attached to it was not a request, it was an order, and he obeyed whether he wanted to or not. He turned to his boss, spatula still in hand, eyes burning with hurt.

"How could you just replace it without…without at least telling me? I mean, I know it's your house, your furniture, you can do what you want with it, but I…it's-" He deflated with a loud sigh, thinking how he must be sounding to the man who had rescued him from that hellish situation in Baltimore and had never asked for single thing back other than to do the best job he could for him.

Gibbs smiled crookedly at him, his eyes twinkling with mirth.

"I knew you'd miss it."

"Then why did you get _rid _of it? It was my favorite piece of furniture, it was how I-"

Tony stopped mid-sentence, realizing he was revealing too much to the older man. Gibbs put a tentative hand on his shoulder to calm him and waited a moment.

"How you what, Tony?"

"How I knew I had a place." He dropped his chin to his chest, and his voice quieted. "A place to go to. It smelled like wood smoke and sawdust and pizza and Old Spice and Abby's and Kate's perfume - home. Where I grew up, the furniture, the house, smelled unused and empty and lonely. Top of the line, interior-decorated lonely."

"Turn off the stove, DiNozzo."

"Huh?" Tony shot up his head at this non sequitur.

"Turn off the stove, yer burnin' breakfast."

Tony turned with a startled shout, seeing smoke and smelling the awful stench of burnt eggs and blackened ham.

"Shit!" he cursed, snapping the flame off and taking the pan off the burner. He sighed again in defeat. It just wasn't turning out to be a good morning. "Shit," he repeated, more to himself than his lone audience.

"I didn't get rid of it, Anthony. It's down in the basement. Made Fornell help me get it down there for taking the other couch off his hands."

Tony turned to him, his eyes lit with hope now instead of loss.

"It's in _your _basement? As in still here?"

"Parked against the wall of the staircase. You can park your _own _ass there now while you're yakkin' to me while I'm working."

Gibbs saw the relief and slight hint of wetness in his second's eyes and kicked himself for not thinking to leave a note or somehow let Tony know where his beloved sofa was. As much as Tony talked about his movies and personal belongings, Gibbs knew they were just objects to him, something to fill the brain space to keep other stuff at bay. People—relationships—were what was important to the young man, even though he had been on the bad end of them a lot more often than most people his age.

But there was something about that couch that had linked DiNozzo to Gibbs, had helped form that first fragile bond of friendship beyond the job with them. It was the first place Tony headed for when he got to Gibbs's place, where he flopped when he was exhausted, where he recovered when he was ill or injured.

That couch, ugly even in Fornell's eyes, hideous in Kate's opinion, was Tony's refuge, and he had clocked up countless hours on it, watching movies, eating snacks, wrestling with Abby, bickering with Kate. It was home to him, something he'd never really had, and more importantly, family, something he _definitely _had spent his entire life lacking, and secretly, longing for.

"I would never get rid of it, Tony, I promise. It's here as long as you want it."

"Thanks, Boss. I know it sounds stupid, but...it's got a lot of-"

"Sentimental value?"

"Energy. Lots of good energy, from all the good times I've had sitting on it."

"I wouldn't call lying on it half-dead with the stomach flu good times, but it's yer call, Tony." Gibbs smiled at him, recalling a week of absolute misery for Tony while he, Abby, Kate and Ducky did their best to humor the kid and keep his mind off the puking and coughing and exploding head. As he further recalled, Tony had been a most unwilling patient, testing their own patience a bit with his inability to accept their willing help.

"Yeah, well...except those times." Tony turned to his burnt offering of breakfast and looked at his watch. "Hey, whataya say we go to that little diner that just opened down the street and try out their breakfast, my treat. Then we'll come back here and I'll test out the basement arrangement while you putter."

"I do _not _putter, DiNozzo!" Gibbs grumped as he turned to grab his jacket and keys. "I _work, _I _build _things, I clean up the messes you and Abby leave making your bird and butterfly houses!"

"Oh, uh, yeah, sorry about that last one, Boss. We had to get them delivered the day before the fundraiser and we were a little pinched for time."

"How much did you guys raise for it from them?"

"Uh, let's see…We took...fifteen bird feeders, five bird houses, and three butterfly houses and they sold them all, so…about five hundred bucks, I guess."

"Not bad, DiNozzo! You guys put some serious work into those things on what was just a bunch of scrap lumber and paint." Gibbs smiled warmly as he unlocked the sedan and they climbed in.

"Yeah, but they were _nice, _Boss, not just your run-of-the-mill garden variety, er, everyday birdhouses and feeders."

"Oh, don't I know it, DiNozzo. It's all I heard about for the next three days from Morrow's wife when she found out who had made them. She'd bought one of each, I think." He started the car, and turned to look at the shocked face of his SFA. "Along with several of her friends. Wants me to make sure you guys do the same thing for the next fund raiser auction, so you two better put your heads together for some serious projects."

"Wow! That's great! And now I have the couch down there to sleep on in between working on them! I'll call Abby when we get back."

"You do that, DiNozzo. I've got some books you can look through to find some more ideas that you should both be able to manage without cutting your fingers off."

Tony looked over at him, his eyes shining with the excitement that Gibbs loved to see in them. "Thanks, Boss. I'll bring the eats. Hey, do you think we can put one of those little fridges down there so we can stash our take out and-"

Gibbs rolled his eyes and harrumphed, but inwardly, he wasn't really against the idea as long as it kept the ones he'd nick-named the Terrible Two out of mischief. Apart they were usually okay, but sometimes when they got together, he was afraid he'd be getting a call from the local LEO's for some lame-brained, spur-of-the-moment idea they got to fix something or help someone. The adage that 'No good deed goes unpunished' seemed to be aimed at his SFA in particular, and he was beginning to realize the energy it took to keep the young man's recklessness in check before anything really serious happened to him.

He just wasn't willing to leave DiNozzo to his own devices like his biological father had so blithely done for so many years. The kid needed boundaries, whether DiNozzo knew it or agreed to it or not, and Gibbs was going to provide them, even if it meant keeping him occupied off the job with simple projects to help Gibbs or a non-profit organization. As long as Tony felt he was being helpful, useful, and was fed some decent meals, he was happy as a pig in shit. If it meant Gibbs making a refuge for him in his basement, so be it. Maybe moving the old couch into the basement was a better idea than first thought. He'd have to make sure to tell Fornell how happy he was with his new couch, even if it _had _belonged to their ex.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: AU, possibly OOC, and Tony is younger than both Abby and Cate. Abby is the middle 'kid' instead of Tony for my stories in this series. There are at least 2 years between each of them. I almost didn't post this, as I realized it was along the same lines of Dixie Dewdrop's wonderful fic, but I had it almost finished by the time he/she posted, so I just went ahead and finished. Any similarity was purely coincidental, sometimes our minds run the same track, I guess! Thank you to gotgoats for the beta. Any remaining mistakes are my own.

And thank you also to the 'guest' who took the time to point out the age discrepancies of the characters on the show, I always thought I was just confused about them after reading fanfic for so long. Silly show writers. It's too bad that the character's ages aren't the only discrepancies over the seasons. This started out as a one-shot, but gotgoats convinced me to make it a second chapter, as there are more to come. Enjoy!

As it turned out, the homey little diner served an excellent breakfast, and Tony proceeded to stuff himself with the Number 4 special; a stack of 'cakes, cheese and mushroom omelet, home fries, and a side of bacon. Gibbs was almost amazed at the amount of food the kid had put away after a night of supposed partying, but he suspected there was a lot less drinking happening with his three 'kids' then any of them let on. And one of them was always a designated driver unless it was a real celebration; then they shared a cab or rented a limo.

Gibbs watched the young man with amusement, glad that the kid enjoyed his food so much, and glad for his company, though it was never something he readily admitted to Tony. Better to just go with the flow with DiNozzo than try to corner him with sentimentality, skittish as he was about being shown affection, especially from his boss. That was easy enough for Gibbs, he'd gotten into the habit of holding back pretty much any emotions save for bad temper and impatience, but much more difficult for Abby and Kate, who saw absolutely no reason not to mother hen the guy, unless they were busy teasing him about his hairstyles or designer jackets, one of which he had ruined already by getting hung up on a chain link fence while chasing down a suspect. Gibbs knew it wouldn't have mattered _what _kind of jacket the kid had been wearing, so he hadn't admonished him for wearing it, but hadn't given him any sympathy, either.

Finally done, Tony wiped his mouth with his napkin a final time and took a last long gulp from his bottomless cup of cocoa. The motherly waitress had made sure to keep both men's cups filled, and now she was setting down two pieces of homemade cherry pie in front of them while a busgirl cleared their table.

"Ohh, _man, _Margaret, yer _killin' _me here!" Tony groaned theatrically, grabbing his stomach and throwing his head back.

"New recipe, gotta have a couple taste testers before we put it on the dessert cart.  
Know you can force yourself, Tony, just take your time, I'll be back in a bit for your expert opinions!"

She winked at Gibbs and topped off his coffee from her cart, then headed for the next table.

"This is _so _much better than my eggs and ham, Boss." Tony exclaimed excitedly. "We need to come here _every_Saturday morning!"

Gibbs smiled indulgently, wondering if his second had any idea he what he was proposing, and helped himself to a mouthful of the pie.

Half an hour later, they were heading for his basement, Tony bringing a bottle of spring water from the fridge and Gibbs yet another cup of coffee. He'd liked the diner's coffee so well he'd had the waitress make him a cup to go, and then left a ten dollar tip for her, almost half of their entire order total, even though she'd spent most of her time doting on Tony who had acted like it was no big deal. But Gibbs could see he was clearly touched, if not a bit embarrassed by it.

He waited to see Tony's reaction to the new basement set-up, and was not disappointed, the surprise on his SFA's face making his extra work last night worth- while. He had found an old end-table in the attic along with another coffee table, both of them left behind by one of his exes and forgotten by him. The same pillows and old blankets were there, however, and Tony collapsed onto the squishy piece of plaid with a delighted and sated sigh, grabbing up the pillow in his arms.

"So what do you think Abs and I should make for the next fund raiser?"

Gibbs rifled through an old box file and grabbed out a folder, holding it out for Tony to take.

"Ah, c'mon, Boss, I just got comfortable and..."

Gibbs snapped the papers in the air, a definite hint that he wasn't going to hoof them over to the younger man, and Tony made his way off the couch with a none-too-quiet groan to take them from him. He settled back on the couch again, studying the papers like the file from a cold case. A minute or so later he looked up at Gibbs, his eyes wide with disbelief.

"You want us to build a doll house?"

Gibbs nodded wordlessly.

"A _doll house _Boss?" Tony repeated.

"A big one. Around two by three feet, give or take a few inches. Abby can find all the furniture to go in it and help ya decorate it."

"A doll house." Tony repeated yet again, staring at the plans in his lap.

"Cost about - well, not much, we can build it mostly out of scrap I have here like ya did yer birdhouses and feeders. Most of the cost is in the doll furniture and stuff."

"Somebody will actually _buy _a big doll house like that?"

"Nobody's gonna buy it, DiNozzo, they're gonna buy tickets on it, say, fifty bucks a shot. How many people come to those fund raisers? A couple hundred or more? Sell a hundred or so tickets, ya got yourself five grand for Habitat. Not any harder building that than a bunch of birdhouses. Make a hell of a lot of money from it. Besides, Abby'll get a kick out of doing it, and she's the one that got you started on the whole thing. Study the plans, get a feel for how to build it, I'll look around for the lumber and hardware."

"Yeah, okay, Boss, I guess if you think it'll make that much money, we've gotta build it. Yeah. 'Build it and they will come.' Tony murmured the last sentence to himself.

"Field of Dreams, Kevin Costner."

"Boss, you knew one of my _movie _quotes!"

"Baseball movie, DiNozzo. Don't spill anything on those plans, I only got one set."

"Got it, Boss." Tony answered as if he was on the job. He settled back on the sofa, as Gibbs hunted for scraps big enough to get started with, and soon he was lying on his back, one arm under his head, mini-house plans in the other. It was a delightful little house, he eventually decided, and he could picture Abby excitedly furnishing it with every miniature known to humankind. Maybe this wasn't such a bad idea after all.

The plans themselves were fairly simple, and he'd probably even be able to manage to cut out the doors and windows himself with a skill saw like he had for the bird houses. He sighed contentedly, his full stomach lulling him to close his eyes and picture the finished product.

A while later he heard a voice, not realizing he had drifted off, and he awoke with a start.

"Wake up, Tony, I found the lumber, you said you wanted to help me build Abby's doll house."

"Yeah, Daddy, I - where's the basement?"

"Basement? We're building it in the garage, it's too cold in the basement now, remember?"

"Huh? Uh - yeah, right. Ummm..."

Gibbs ruffled his hair and chuckled.

"No _wonder _yer mom doesn't let you take naps this late in the day. C'mon, Goofy, we need to get this built before your sister's birthday next week, Catie's gonna find all the furniture and decorations for it. She'll end up playing with it as much as Abby, even though she says she's too old for it. Just hope they don't get in any big fights over where the furniture goes like they do in their bedroom."

"That's for sure, last time they made me try to take sides and I ended up getting my head stuffed inside Cate's gym bag. Whoever said girls were cleaner than boys never had to smell Cate's gym bag."

Gibbs barked out a laugh, his brain conjuring up a picture of his six year old son at the mercy of his two older sisters. He was generally a good kid, and didn't always deserve the rough treatment he got from them, though there were times he could try even his mother's patience with his hair-brained and sometimes dangerous ideas. But most of the time, his two older sisters doted on him, and defended him even against Gibbs himself if they thought he was being too hard on him. Gibbs had never had any siblings to defend him or torment him, and he was glad his youngest child was well-covered, even if his girls did go a bit overboard on both accounts.

Tony trailed along behind him, occasionally tripping over a loose sneaker shoelace, until Gibbs stopped in the middle of the breezeway and sent his son crashing into his backside.

"Buddy, how many times have I told you to keep your shoes laced, yer gonna fall and knock out _all_your teeth and your sisters will never let you live it down." He turned to make sure his son was indeed rectifying his untied laces. "Remember that time you fell a couple months ago and split open your forehead?"

"Cate and Abby told me I looked like Frankenstein's monster." Tony answered quietly.

Even though he really didn't know what they were talking about, he'd been mortified to be compared to _anyone's _monster. The row of stitches had hurt like hell, and he didn't even want to remember what they felt like being put in. It was the first time ever he'd seen tears in his dad's eyes, as Gibbs had stood beside the E.R. table smoothing his hand over his son's arm while Ducky laced in the sutures as gently as he could. And in spite of Abby and Cate's teasing, they had waited on him hand and foot, especially after finding out their little brother had a concussion. Their dad had acted differently, too, ever since coming back from the hospital, which had sobered them considerably. He'd disappeared out to his workshop until dinner time, then was moody and quiet the rest of the night, until Tony burst into tears thinking he had done something very wrong to upset his father so much, and then had had to face the ire of his girls until he'd set things right with his boy.

"Double knot them so they don't keep coming undone. Don't know why the heck they make the laces so long on those things."

Gibbs watched intently as his son's nimble fingers worked the shoe laces and got them back to code. He'd always tried hard not to bring his Marine standards to bear on his kids, but never held back when it came to their safety. Especially his accident prone youngest. When he was done, Tony leaped into the air for a high five from his dad, and Gibbs obliged with a grin.

"Good job! Now let's go get the pieces cut out and nailed together, I'd like to get a coat of paint on it before dinner."

Four hours and lots of sawing, sanding, nailing and painting later, the doll house was mostly done, save for trim around the little windows and doors. Gibbs was applying the last of the first coat when he realized it was uncharacteristically quiet in the formerly noisy workshop. No more chattering from his normally enthusiastic son.  
Looking over him, Gibbs found Tony still on his bench chair, head lying on an arm as he watched his father work.

"You not feeling good, Tone?"

"My throat hurts. Feels all sharp and scratchy."

"Yeah, thought maybe you were coming down with something when I found you sleeping earlier. C'mon, we're done here, let's get you something light for dinner and then get you into your pjs. Feel like eating anything?"

"Ice cream." Tony murmured, snuggling into his father's neck as Gibbs lifted him off the chair. Gibbs could feel the warmth radiating from his youngest, and felt his forehead. A definite fever had started up, but he kept it to himself. Tony hated being sick, and it would only agitate him to know he was.

"Yeah, that's m'boy. We'll get ya some of that. I'll get you in your jammies first and we can snuggle up on the couch, how does that sound?"

Tony nodded into his shoulder.

"Sounds good, daddy." he answered in almost a whisper. "Can we maybe have a movie?"

"I'll get Catie to find one for you, she knows what you like."

"Don't tell her I'm sick, she won't leave me alone all night if you do."

Gibbs huffed a laugh into his son's ear.

"No, buddy, she won't. I won't tell her."

And he didn't, but they all knew when he carried a clinging Tony into the kitchen and grabbed the ice cream from the freezer that all was not well. Abby saw them first, and made to interrogate her father, but he gave her a tight head shake and she got the message and backed off.

"Bud and I are gonna watch a movie, can you go ask Cate to find one for us, then go tell mommy I'm putting his jammies on him?"

"Sure daddy!" she told him cheerfully, pretending nothing was out of the ordinary with her brother.

"Thanks, Abs. Mommy will know what to do."

"Yup! She will! I'll be right back!"

Gibbs graced her with a grateful smile, thankful that she was astute enough to go with the flow and keep from upsetting her youngest sibling. Half an hour later, Gibbs was settled on the sofa with Tony on his lap, flannel pajamas on, bowl of chocolate marshmallow ice cream in hand, while 'National Velvet' played on the tv. To Tony's dismay, his sisters were parked on either side of them, supposedly to watch the movie too. He knew they both loved the horse classic, so he couldn't say too much about why they were hovering. Barely half-way through the movie, Tony was a sound asleep, a combo of fever and children's cold medicine working against him.

Gibbs gathered him into his arms and took him up to bed, kissing damp hair on his forehead and arranging the blankets around him.

"Hope you feel better, baby boy. I need you help me finish Abby's birthday present."

"I will, daddy." Tony whispered, still half-asleep. "Want it to be done in time for Abs..."

"Okay, buddy, I'm sure it will be, you just sleep now, we'll finish it tomorrow."

"You wake me up before you go out to the garage, promise, Daddy?"

"Alright, I promise, buddy. It's warm enough out there for you, you should be fine."

"Okay." Tony sighed, ready to stop talking and start sleeping now that he felt assured that he wouldn't miss out from having a stupid cold. " 'Night, daddy."

" 'Night, Tony. See you in the morning, buddy, bright and early."

Gibbs did a last check of his boy's blankets and turned off all but the night light, stopping to watch Tony's congested but steady breathing even out before leaving the room. He almost dreaded the next morning, knowing from past experience that his boy would be too sick to enjoy working with him in the garage, and then feel guilty for delaying Abby's present until he was well enough to help him finish it.

Well, if worse came to worse, he'd bring the doll house to Tony and they could work on it from the living room couch, where the kid was sure to be parked for the next few days. Giving his wife and girls each a smooch, he headed back to the garage to put the second coat of paint on to dry overnight so he could bring the miniature house into the living room in the morning.

And just as predicted, Tony was nearly hoarse with laryngitis the next morning, and relegated to the couch over strenuous objections and complaints, which did no good, even with genuine tears. He only stopped fussing when he saw the doll house on the blanketed coffee table, the final pieces and touches ready to be applied and finished. Tony beamed at his father through thoroughly watered eyes, his long lashes glistening with tears. It was one of the many times Gibbs understood why Tony's sisters indulged him so often, and Gibbs wasn't totally immune to it, either.

"Thank you, Daddy." Tony squeaked out, even more hoarse from his recent crying jag, and wiped his eyes with his pajama sleeve.

"Yer welcome, buddy. Now c'mon, drink your juice so we can get this thing finished before Abby gets home from grocery shopping with Mommy. I'll wait till ya finish, just take yer time."

Gibbs sat down next to him, rubbing Tony's head while he drank the rest of his orange juice, and he felt the boy lean into him with a long, raggedy sigh.

"If you start getting too tired, you just tell me, we'll take a break, then go back to it. Mommy will call before they head home so we know to take it back out to the garage in time. How does that sound?"

Tony nodded his agreement instead of trying to answer through his lumpy sore throat.

"Good boy. Okay then. First we need to put some carpenter's glue on these little trim pieces here and frame them around the windows...

"Tony? Tony? _DiNozzo!" _Gibbs finally bellowed, concerned that his second wasn't responding to his voice.

"Daddy?" Tony sat up fast, knocking his bottle of water and the mini-house plans to the floor.

"Don't _think _so." Gibbs smirked, stifling a chuckle trying to erupt from his throat. "Try again."

"Gih- Gibbs? What - where..."

"On the couch - in my basement. You fell asleep after we got home from the diner. I've been searching out lumber, took me a while." Gibbs studied DiNozzo, taking in his jittery eyes and the damp hair on his forehead. "You feelin' okay, you look a little off."

"Sore throat. I'm okay, just need some juice."

"You gonna be able to work on this, cause we've pretty much got all weekend, and it won't take that long to slam it together."

Tony stared glassy-eyed at his boss, still not fully grasping reality.

"Gotta be done by Abby's birthday."

"Abby's birthday isn't for another four months. And it's for the Habitat fund raiser. What the hell were you dreaming, Tony?"

"I - I was -" he swallowed hard, his throat feeling a little raw, like he'd been swallowing rocks or something.

Gibbs reached over and put a hand to his SFA's forehead.

"You got a fever, Tony. Must've given you a nightmare."

"No, no, it was - it wasn't a nightmare." he insisted, a bit hoarsely.

"Whatever, it doesn't matter now, just shut yer yap and save your throat. I'll got get ya some orange juice and throat lozenges. You can watch while I measure and cut. That way you'll have a leg up on the next one and it'll be a snap for ya."

"Thanks, dih- er, Boss, if that's okay with you."

"Fine with me, Tony." Gibbs told him pointedly. "Might as well start utilizing that couch down here, that's what it's here for. Grab yourself one of the blankets, there's not heater down here yet and you'll be feeling cool with that fever."

Gibbs bounded up the stairs while Tony pulled one of the old quilts off the back of the couch and wrapped it around himself. His boss was right, he was beginning to feel chilled, and the thick coverlet felt good tucked around him. Minutes later Gibbs was back with juice and a myriad of remedies, including a tub of Vicks Vapo Rub and a bottle of Motrin.

"Take the Motrin before we get started, put the Vicks on when you think you need it. I'll find a pencil and tape measure and get started."

"If Abby or Cate calls, please don't tell them I'm sih - I'm not a hundred percent, I just wanna spend the day on the couch watching you work, not getting smothered by them."

"Understood, DiNozzo, don't blame ya there. Can't help ya if they drop by, though, yer gonna have to get some color back in your face or they'll know for sure."

"Crap, _really, _Boss? I didn't feel that bad this morning, just a little scratchiness!"

"Well, it shows, can see it in yer eyes, too. Might as well give in to the wave if one of 'em shows up. In the meantime, I can pretend you're totally fine, as soon as you take the Motrin and drink your juice."

"Got it, Boss. Thanks."

"Yer welcome. Now sit back and rest. You feel like it later, I've got a couple half gallons of ice cream in the freezer, we can make a dent in them."

Tony broke into a wide, beaming grin, more than he usually expressed, even at the mention of ice cream, and Gibbs eyed him warily.

"I'd like that, Boss. You don't happen to have a pair of flannel pajamas around anywhere, do you?"

A/N 2: Who was Gibbs's wife/Tony's mom in his dream? I didn't have anyone specific in mind, so you can all fill-in-the-wife/mommy blank with whoever suits you!


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Thank you, Bunny for the beta! Someone asked me why sometimes I used Kate and other times Cate, and it's just 'cause I'm kinda slow to realizing that if she was Caitlyn, her nick-name would also start with a C, but I got in the habit of using the K. Trying to break it now. Oh, and thanks to all who reviewed, favorited/followed.**

_**Summary: Tony gets his first taste of confinement to his favorite couch after an accident at work. Based loosely on the ep 'Hung Out to Dry' as I pilfered the scene of him getting tossed out of the plane. Such a wonderful whumping opportunity gone completely to waste, I decided to use it for this one-shot. A/U and probably OOC. Third chapter in the 'Refuge' series.**_

* * *

_****_  
Whether Tony liked it or not, he wasn't sure; it wasn't anything he thought he would ever get used to, having someone like Gibbs looking out for him. It was something he'd always secretly longed for, _needed, _but now that he had it, didn't quite know what to do with it. He admitted he needed a little more attention than the average agent, because he could, and would, readily admit that he _wasn't _a regular agent, he was _Gibbs's special agent, _and SFA, and that meant giving a hundred and ten percent all of the time.

Even if it meant being shoved out of a C-130 at 13,000 feet after a fight ensued aboard the plane while trying to prove the guilt of a drug-dealing Marine. Gibbs had hung in the doorway of the plane, his heart in his throat as he watched his SFA plummet towards earth, and only started breathing again when he saw the parachute burst open what seemed like an eternity later, but was in reality only seconds. He left Cate to bring in the suspect with the help of MPs and ordered an ambulance with medics to take him to Tony's drop site, about a half mile from where he would have been had he actual _planned _on taking the jump out of the lumbering plane. His homing device located, they'd tracked him down to a swampy, tangled grove and found him still doing battle with his canopy.

Half out of it from shock, cold, and probably a jar to the head, Tony had struggled to extricate himself from the thing, and Gibbs screamed at the accompanying Marines to help him cut it off the younger man. In unknown territory, and angry at everyone, including himself for volunteering for such a hair-brained mission, Tony had flailed and yelled and even kicked, not really being able to see anyone or anything in the dark, until Gibbs had grabbed him by the shoulders and shouted into his ear to ground him.

And Tony had settled, just like that, and let Gibbs and the others clear the canopy and chute pack from him and the medics give him as thorough exam as they could by the light of the ambulance. There were bumps, bruises and scrapes on nearly every inch of Tony's body from banging into trees and brush on his way to earth, but worst of the bumps was the one forming around his right ankle. It was either badly sprained or fractured, and required x-raying to really know for sure. Gibbs had saved him the embarrassment of a ride to the hospital in the back of the ambulance by taking him there himself, but only if he promised to follow whatever the doctors ordered him to do. Well, it was one of those two options, or try walking back to civilization by himself, and besides, his ankle hurt like a bitch.

Now he was ensconced on 'his' couch in Gibb's basement, ankle firmly encased in a plaster cast, being fed Motrin and steak subs and donuts, and anything else Abby and Kate could think of to bring him that they knew he liked. Gibbs had wanted him upstairs so he didn't have to struggle up the steps to use the head, but Tony swore he was an expert at walking in a cast, even going up and down stairs, and that he'd 'hold it' as long as he could so he wouldn't have to be mobile so much. It was a small enough cast that even Ducky agreed it was manageable with due care, so Gibbs relented and let his second make a little nest for himself on the couch while he recuperated.

"Abby's bringing your laptop from work, Cate's signing out a box of cold-cases, and I'm spending the day working on the bookcases for the living room."

"Cold cases, Boss? You'd kick a guy when he's down?"

"Broke your ankle, DiNozzo, not your brain or your arm. Thought you _liked _working on cold-cases. "

"Yes, the operative word is _work, _and I'm not there."

"You're getting paid for sick leave, might as well earn it."

Tony tried to think of a way to persuade the man his thinking was just a little off-kilter, but decided it was a foolish waste of his time and brain cells and grabbed up his book instead.

"Well, fine, but until they get here with them, I'm using my sick-leave to actually be sick and read for a while."

He pulled his casted ankle up onto the couch with a hiss and hoped his boss hadn't heard it. Yeah, right.

"Need more Motrin?" the man asked without looking up from his measuring job.

"No, just took some a while ago. Think I'm at my limit right now."

"Day's just starting, you need to get ahead of the pain before it gets bad."

"It'll be fine, Boss. This is a lot less serious than some of my football injuries, and that time I - well, anyways, it's not that bad, just takes some getting used to is all. Still, I'd just as soon have not gotten pitched out of the plane in the first place."

Gibbs was silent, not wanting to verbalize his own thoughts on the matter. Getting a couple of quick lessons on the ground was no preparation for actually jumping out of an airplane in pitch dark, and totally unexpectedly, at that. He himself had had a decent amount of jump experience, and knew that night jumps could sometimes be a crap shoot when it came to safety, even with experienced paratroopers. He had been on the verge of strangling whoever had pushed Tony out the door, regardless of the fact that it was purely accidental, and that no one really knew who had done it. Or if they did, they were not suicidal enough to admit it.

He glanced up from his work at his second, just to make sure Tony wasn't hiding any symptoms of pain from him. He knew DiNozzo had been embarrassed about not being in control when he got tossed out of the plane, but no one had expected the sudden burst of outrage towards the suspect which caused the chain reaction of Tony ending up shaken and stirred a mile short of the drop zone. Other than Ducky and Gibbs, no one knew that Tony had long, brush burn-like scrapes and deep bruising. The way he shifted his torso around as if to take pressure off them hadn't escaped Gibbs's notice.

"I'm fine, Boss," Tony assured him, knowing Gibbs was watching him even though he himself was still reading his book. "Abby made me take two Motrin with my sandwich. Cate force-fed me two when she was here this morning. There's a limit to how many of them I can take without putting a hole in my stomach lining."

Gibbs smiled to himself, partly from the fact that Tony knew he was eyeballing him, and partly because he was amused that Cate and Abby had been waiting on the young man hand and foot. The coffee table in front of the couch was littered with take-out bags and boxes. Underneath that, the table was covered with new magazines and puzzle books and an iPod, all bought and brought by the gals since discovering where Tony was hiding out.

In all honesty, it hadn't been much of a mystery. Abby was on his doorstep almost before it was light out that morning to drop off pastries and the sweetened tea Tony had been drinking lately, and Cate had shown up not much later with submarine sandwiches, promising that they were full of meat and cheese and mayo, without a trace of the evil tofu. Gibbs thought back on the reaction of both women when they had been informed about Tony's accidental night jump. He'd steeled himself both times, knowing he'd get an earful about how he could 'let Tony _do _such an idiotic thing?'

_**FLASHBACK**_

_"Agent Todd, I need you to get a couple of MPs to help you get Dafelmair to the Yard for questioning, don't let the bastard out of your sight."_

_"Why, Gibbs, I thought you and Tony were here on base?"_

_"I'm here on base, Tony's - we're going to pick him right now."_

_"Pick him_

_up? I thought he was with you! Didn't he go on the plane with you?"_

_"Yes, he did, but -"_

_"You let him JUMP, Gibbs? How the hell could you let him DO such an idiotic thing, he's never even TRAINED for it, and you let him jump in the DARK?"_

_"I didn't LET him do ANYTHING, Cate. He got pushed out of the plane!"_

_Total, dead silence followed, and he almost hung up on her then and there to be done with it, but amazingly enough, didn't dare. He knew she'd just keep calling him until he got blazing mad and lost his temper in front of Tony's rescue crew. So he waited, watching houses and traffic speed by from the back of the military ambulance. When she started talking again, he wished he hadn't waited so long to respond. Her voice was shaky with tears, her throat constricted._

_"He's alright, right, Gibbs? I mean, he's alive and in one piece, right?"_

_"I - I dunno, Catie, they located him by his homing device, they say the area he landed in was pretty open. They make sure the guys have a wide berth in case of wind shifts and stuff. We weren't very far from the actual drop zone when he fell out."_

_"Gibbs, you've gotta get to him, NOW, he's probably hurt, he wouldn't know what to do in an emergency situation like that, he-"_

_"He'll keep his head, Cate, you know how he is under pressure."_

_"He just got tossed out of a plane at 13,000 feet on a pitch black night! And it's started to get stormy!"_

_"I'm doing all I can at the moment, Agent Todd," Gibbs grated back, wondering why in hell she thought he may just be sitting at the base commissary having a coffee while his second was missing, perhaps badly hurt, or worse._

_"I - I know, Gibbs, sorry. I just - it was just a set-up, nothing was supposed to go wrong like this!"_

_"I know, Cate. You meet the MPs back at the base and get him to the Navy Yard, and if he gives you any crap, you tell him you have orders from me to shoot him where he stands. I'll try calling you as soon as we get to him, but I don't know what kind of cell reception is out there. And Cate, he's going to be fine, he's got enough training from his football and cop days to help him out, he'll know what to do."_

_"He'd better or I'll drop him on his head myself!"_

_"Gotta go, Agent Todd, getting close to where they think he is. I'll be in touch."_

_Gibbs snapped the phone shut, unwilling to speculate anymore about the shape his SFA might be in, and using the energy instead to will the young man into being in one piece when they found him. In the year and a half he had known DiNozzo, the kid had unintentionally wound himself around Gibbs's little finger, much to Gibbs's dismay. Not even Abby was able to push as many paternal buttons in the man as Tony, and Gibbs still wasn't quite sure why. And at the moment, there wasn't a button he could think of that wasn't being held down tight, running the gamut from ice-cold fear of finding DiNozzo lying dead of a broken neck, to absolute determination that he was merely bruised and scared but still breathing on his own._

_He didn't like the feeling one tiny bit, and made a mental note to himself to rebuild that wall he had so skillfully constructed over the years, the one that Tony had unknowingly, and quite unwittingly, made a DiNozzo-shaped hole in not very long after agreeing to join Gibbs's team. He heard his own voice laughing back at him that it was way too late in the game for mortar and trowels, and that any rebuilding being done was by Tony himself, putting Gibbs's pieces back together again._

_It hadn't helped that both Abby and Cate each made it their goal in life to show Tony that it was possible to have loving, platonic relationships with women, and treated him like he was a long-lost younger brother to them both. Sometimes it was just too much for Gibbs to digest; wallowing in childless heartache for years, only to be thrust into a father-figure role for a very spirited, yet very damaged, young man.  
_  
_They spotted a shadowy form right near where their GPS trackers had pinned down DiNozzo, and Gibbs's heart leapt at the realization that not only was his favorite SFA alive, but able to stand up, or more accurately, wobble around on one leg while doing battle with his canopy. Gibbs barely waited for the ambulance to stop before bursting out its back doors and running towards the hapless accidental jumper. _

_It was raining hard enough that the ground was soggy and slippery, and he almost landed on his own ass in his hurry to prevent DiNozzo from landing on his. He could hear a steady stream of low-volume Marine-ish cursing coming from Tony, and couldn't blame him in the least for being rude as he grabbed him by the shoulders and shouted at him over the thunder._

_"Tony, take it easy, we're here for you, medics have some dry clothes and blankets for ya!"_

_"Boss?" Tony's voice cracked with relief and pain, and he latched onto his boss's arm like it was a life preserver. "Wasn't sure you'd find me, didn't know if I'd broken my homing device when I hit the dirt!"_

_A loud clap of thunder had him jolting towards Gibbs, the last of his reserves gone with the cold rain pouring down on him and his inability to extricate himself from his chute pack. Gibbs gathered him up before gravity claimed him, and held him close, talking only loudly enough in DiNozzo's ear for the younger man to hear._

_"Yer gonna be fine, kiddo, I got yer six. C'mon, let's get outta this storm before we both get fried. Can ya walk okay?"_

_"Boss, I -" Tony's voice was barely there now, shock and exhaustion starting to win out. "Can't…sorry."_

_"Tony, it's okay," Gibbs tried to assure him, rubbing the back of DiNozzo's head. "You weren't ready to fall out of a cargo plane at twenty thousand feet, not your fault." He turned and screamed at the waiting medics, scared shitless now at Tony's admission that he couldn't make it on his own to the waiting ambulance. "Need a stretcher here, now!"_

_He turned his attention back to Tony, and did his best to act calm and collected for him. "Cate's waiting back at the Yard with some hot chocolate for ya, sooner we get ya looked over, the sooner we can get back there."_

_Tony had eventually acquiesced and let Gibbs help him onto the stretcher, too far gone to fight it anymore. Once inside the ambulance, they gently peeled off his sopping jump clothes, and Gibbs grimaced at the torn garments and the number of bruises forming on Tony's cold skin. Obviously he had hit more than the dirt while he was landing, but there didn't seem to be any wound gushing blood. Eventually he admitted to them that he thought maybe, possibly, he MIGHT have twisted his ankle upon his jarred meeting with the earth, and the medics inspected it to find it grossly swollen and all shades of purple._

_"Yeah, DiNozzo, you TWISTED it alright. Looks like you'll be spending some quality time on the plaid after Ducky gets his hands on ya. I gotta call Kate and let 'er know yer still with us; she and Abby have probably pulled all their hair out by now wondering if you're in one piece." He rested a firm hand on Tony's arm to ground him and keep him from struggling against the medics inserting an IV and nasal canula. He maneuvered his cell phone with the other hand. "Let 'em help ya, Tony. Just till we get ya to Ducky. Then I'll send 'em away."_

_True to his word, Gibbs let the medics bring Tony as far as the ground floor elevator, then sent them on their way. The M.E. was waiting in his office, having been summoned there by a frantic Cate, and having no idea what sort of condition his young friend was in. When Gibbs arrived, he was toting DiNozzo in a wheelchair commandeered from security, and Ducky knew things were more serious than a few bumps and scratches. Listening patiently to Gibbs's account of Tony's treatment by the medics, the M.E. wheeled the x-ray machine over to his patient, while Gibbs helped his surprisingly pliant SFA up onto an exam table. Ducky elected to skip his general exam of his live patient in lieu of Gibbs's information of the treatment Tony had already received, and went straight for his lower right leg, gently looking it over and clicking his tongue with annoyance at the condition of it._

_"Honestly, Jethro, of all the ways to get injured on this job, what in the world were you thinking?"_

_"Thinking of getting a confession from a drug-dealing murderer, Ducky, didn't plan on 'im getting pitched out of the plane."_

_"And yet he did. Hold very still, Anthony, it will just take a few seconds..." He snapped the picture and rolled the machine out of the way. "You may go lie on my office sofa now while I develop your photos. Your beloved boss will help you get there. And DO NOT leave said sofa until I have come to speak with you. BOTH of you."_

_Both men were able to read the anger clearly written in Ducky's eyes, and were about to make amends when Cate and Abby barreled through the doors of Autopsy, looking like two of the Three Stooges in their hurry to get in._

_"Why didn't anyone tell us you were here, we were going NUTS wondering what was happening with him!" Abby fairly screeched in a loud, unlady-like tone. She didn't wait for an answer from anyone as she and Cate made their way over to their surrogate-brother to find out for themselves the condition he was in._

_"Abigail, Caitlyn, you will wait until Anthony is well enough to defend himself before overwhelming him with your tender ministrations."_

_Gibbs had to stifle a chuckle at the shocked looks on both of the women's faces as they were stymied by the equally protective doctor._

_"He's got a busted ankle, he's gonna go lie down on the couch while Ducky looks at the x-ray."_

_"Not busted, Boss..." Tony reminded, trying to put some force into the statement, but it was mostly a barely-heard wheeze._

_"Yeah, sure DiNozzo. Come on, yer gettin' too heavy for me to hold up here, let's get ya to Ducky's couch, then you can come home to yours."_

_"Mmmm..." was all he got back from his SFA, not even realizing he had called HIS home Tony's home too._

_"I'll go get things ready!" Abby chimed in excitedly, "C'mon, Cate, he's gonna need a bunch of stuff to keep him out of trouble! There's an all-night Wally World we can go to. I'll make a list, you drive!"_

_Cate had no chance to even protest as she was dragged out of Autopsy and towards the elevator as Gibbs dragged Tony to the sofa._

_"You lie here for a few minutes while I get ya some dry clothes," Gibbs ordered, settling Tony's injured leg as gently as he could up onto the couch and arranging a blanket over him. "Don't move!" he pointed a finger in Tony's bleary face. "I'll be right back." He strode out of the tiny office and out the doors, yelling to the M.E. on his way out. "Gone to get Tony some dry clothes, Duck, hold down the fort for a few minutes!"_

_Ducky heard him, but didn't take the time to reply, absorbed as he was in the x-ray of Tony's ankle. Gibbs had been right of course, it was broken, and rather badly. Not something that could be mended with a walking boot; a plaster cast and crutches would definitely be called for this time around. He sighed loudly, still disgusted with the lead agent for taking what he considered foolish risks._

_The broken ankle was bad enough, and it could have turned into something so much worse; Ducky shuddered to think of the consequences of the 'much worse'. Tony had become rather deeply embedded in their lives, and they in his, though some were more willing to confront that fact than others. Ducky knew all too well that there were risks involved in being a federal agent on a MCRT, but to accompany a crew of Marines on a night training mission twenty thousand plus feet in the air was just asking for trouble._

_Ah well, Caitlyn and Abigail would do the job of never letting their boss forget the incident, even though it had served its purpose, so he would stick to treating his patient and belay anymore tongue-lashing on Gibbs, who would only grumble and ignore him anyways._

_By the time Ducky had developed and studied the x-rays, the lead agent was back with sweatpants, sweatshirt and socks from his go-bag, and they set to the task of undressing and re-dressing a recalcitrant and irritable DiNozzo. And neither had even told him yet of his impending hospital visit. _

_In the end, the two of them just herded him into the wheelchair he'd ridden in on, shoved him into the back of a company sedan, and brought him to the ER before he even really knew where they were. Ducky had called ahead to warn them, and was able to locate a doctor he knew that was on call, reducing the chances of Tony having time to rally and make a concerted effort to escape their clutches._

_When Gibbs got him home, he was so far gone from the muscle relaxant that he'd let a waiting Abby and Cate fuss over him for over half an hour before their boss banished them from the basement so Tony could get some peace and quiet and with that, some much-needed sleep. And slept he had, with only an occasional jolt awake, memory of his sudden drop out of the plane jerking his body around. But the sedative slipped into his cocoa by Cate kept him relaxed enough to go back to sleep soon after. Gibbs himself had not slept at all, save for some stolen moments dozing under his boat, and still half-awake even then to keep an ear on his basement guest._

_He was more than thrilled when Abby had brought him two very large coffees from his favorite 'caffeine dealer'…He was also surprised, as he was sure she'd cut him out of her thoughts completely for being so cavalier with her surrogate brother's well-being._

_**END FLASHBACK**__  
_  
"You wish we'd done it a different way, Tony?"

"Done _what _a different way, Boss?" DiNozzo questioned back without his eyes leaving his book.

"Gotten Dadelmair to cave."

Tony grinned, finally turning to speak to Gibbs directly. "Cate and Abby give you a hard time about our methods?"

"_And _Ducky. And 'hard time' is an understatement. Thought they were _all _gonna have my hide nailed to the wall over this."

"Did you come up with a better way to do it since last night?" he asked seriously.

"Tried like hell, actually. Still haven't."

"Well don't get me wrong, 'cause I was plenty pissed by the time I hit the ground and everything else along the way on my way _to _it…but do you really think, knowing how I feel about airplanes in general, that I would've volunteered to go up in one of those things on a pitch dark and stormy night if I thought there had been a better way to do it?"

Gibbs pondered his second's words, remembering not too long ago a rather inebriated confession from DiNozzo about fear of heights and roller coasters. Not something he had expected from the daredevil agent, but he knew everyone had their fears, himself included.

"Nope. Guess not."

"Then stop second guessing yourself and ignore the majority opinion. You know there's always, _always _a chance for a screw-up on an op. Hell, we could get shot going out to question a suspect or witness, they all know that. They're just being armchair agents."

"Don't be too hard on 'em, Tony," Gibbs chided quietly, going back to his woodworking. "It scared the hell out of 'em. Gonna take 'em a while to work past the thought of me finding you in a mangled heap with a broken neck." _Gonna take me longer, along with a boatload of bourbon, to work past seeing you heading for the ground not knowing if you really had a clue of how to work that chute..._"They'll calm down in a couple days, might even quit givin' me the evil eye when they don't think I'm lookin'."

Tony snorted out a laugh at that, and took a swig of the sports drink Cate had insisted he have with his lunch.

"Yeah, they will. They always do eventually. Where I, on the other hand, will never be able to look at a C-130 with quite the same awe that I used to. Must've been karma that you goaded me into taking that little paratrooper instruction class thing. Wouldn't have known a pin from a toggle without it. But I suppose survival instinct would've kicked in and I would've figured it out anyways. Right after I'd peed my pants."

It was Gibbs's turn to snort out a chuckle, but he knew Tony was right. The kid would've figured it out, in spite of being scared out of his wits. He was the best person the gunny had ever met when it came to thinking on his feet—even this time, with his feet over two miles off the ground. Still, bad things happened to even experienced sky divers, and Gibbs's gut clenched every time he thought about what the loss of his SFA would do to him.

He was in this 'family' thing up to his eyeballs, whether he wanted to be or not, and there was no going back now. He'd just have to learn to 'deal' as Abby was so fond of telling him whenever something he wasn't comfortable with happened that he couldn't change.

"Wouldn't have known if ya had. You were soaked to the skin when we got to ya."

_"I _would've known if I had, Boss. And by the way, thanks for not making a huge deal out of this like Abby and Cate. Although I do appreciate the couch-time."

"Yer welcome, DiNozzo, let's just not make a habit of you needing to park there from gettin' hurt. This is your last 'get out of the hospital free' card, so no more big pile ups, got it?"

"Got it, Boss. No more boo boos, I promise!"

"Good. Gonna hold ya to that."


	4. Chapter 4

Four days after Tony's ungraceful fall from the plane landed him in an ankle cast and on sick leave, Gibbs reluctantly started back to work. Morrow had taken the team off rotation for a few days, and Gibbs had actually enjoyed the down-time, catching up on chores around the house and making sure his couch guest was entertained and out of trouble. In between, they'd watched some movies and stuffed themselves with take-out and beer. The day before, Gibbs had grilled some steaks, made popcorn, and amazed and surprised his SFA by making some really great chocolate chip cookies, which they'd polished off by the end of the day.

"Boss, I don't understand why I can't go in with you. I can sit at my desk and work, I swear I won't go anywhere but to the head and the breakroom."

"Ducky said a week. He meant it. I'm not gonna listen to him lecturing me all day about not following his orders. Tomorrow's the weekend already. If we don't catch a case, I'll be back to keep you company."

"Boss, it's not that, it's…I'm…I dunno, going nuts? Not that I don't appreciate your TLC, but-"

"Ya can't go out in the field, Tony, so what difference does it make if yer stuck here or stuck at your desk?"

"I don't know, Boss, it's just _weird _not being at work for so long."

"A couple more days, DiNozzo, you can suck it up for that much longer."

And Gibbs had gone to work and left him to his own devices, which worried him more than a little. It would be just like DiNozzo to call a cab and come into work against orders, or worse yet, get so antsy he did something _really _stupid like fall headfirst down the basement stairs on his way back to the plaid couch he'd spent a good share of the last few days on.

Gibbs checked his watch again, trying to occupy his worried brain by answering some of the dozens of emails that had somehow accumulated over the past few weeks. Damn. What did anyone have to tell him that was so important they couldn't just call him on the phone? Concentrating now on who to answer and who to delete without a second thought, it took him a few extra moments to realize someone was hovering in front of his desk.

"Yer actually answering email? Must be really slow in the old bullpen today. Awful quiet too, where's yer motor mouth?"

Fornell took a swig from his Styrofoam cup and waited for the indignant reply to erupt.

"Parked on his ass in the basement if he knows what's good for 'im."

"Ah, still confined to his couch. Bet _that's _gotten old in a big hurry."

"Too bad for him. Ducky's orders, not mine."

"You just left him home alone with a cast on his leg? Up and down the cellar stairs? Maybe you really _are_trying to get rid of him. You could've just called me, I would've been happy to take him off your hands."

Fornell took another leisurely drag from the cup, waiting for the expected reaction.

"If you're waiting for me to get all bent 'cause yer tryin' to steal my second, just keep waiting."

"Not trying to steal anything from you, Jethro. Sayin' I'll go check on 'im, make sure he's not upside down somewhere. If he is, I'll let ya know."

Gibbs looked up at his friend, studying him.

"And if he isn't, you gonna tell 'im I sent ya to babysit 'im?"

"Nope. Gonna tell 'im he did good on his last assignment, maybe bring 'im some take-out or something."

Gibbs went back to his steady deleting. "Yeah, think he'd like that, Tobias, he's getting' pretty antsy the past couple days. Bet he'd like to see a new face for a change."

"Great. Now you can actually get some work done instead of watching the clock and keepin' that itchy finger off his speed dial number. Like I say, if he's fine, which I'm sure he is, you won't hear from me."

"Whataya filing this under for your day's assignment, Tobias? Inter-agency Visit a Shut-In Day?"

"Don't need to file it under anything, I've got the day off. See ya!"

**. . . . .**

When Fornell arrived at Gibbs's with bags in hand, he half-expected Tony to be out in the driveway shooting hoops with one crutch. As it was, the kid was standing at the sink doing up the breakfast dishes, wobbling precariously as he went from dishpan to dishwater to drying rack. Fornell announced himself, not wanting to startle the injured man, knocking on the dining room woodwork.

"Hey, DiNutso, boss know yer doin' such dangerous work?"

"Never told me I couldn't!" Tony replied smugly, drying his hands after racking the last mug and turning a beaming smile on for the older man. He genuinely liked Fornell, though in the MCRT bullpen, it often appeared differently. Then an awful thought suddenly appeared to him, wiping the smile from his face and giving it one of panic. "Wha–why're you here, is everybody okay?"

"Yeah, kid, everybody's fine. Sorry, didn't mean to scare ya, just had the day off, was out doing errands, figured I'd swing by and see if you needed anything."

"Oh, yeah, okay!" Tony gave a visible sigh of relief at Fornell's answer. "So what's in the bags?"

"Lunch, if ya want some. Brought stuff to make some fettuccine alfredo with broccoli. Loaf of bread, some oil, and some cream horns from the bakery near Todd."

He set the bags down on Gibbs's dining room table and Tony broke into a shit-eating grin at the man. "You tryin' to poach me, Toby? A little dinner and dessert and I'll hop into the Fibbie's nest of vipers?"

"DiNutso, I'm hurt!" Fornell stepped back theatrically, throwing a hand over his heart. "We are _not _a nest of vipers! Bears, _maybe..._and besides, you can't judge all of us by Agent Sacks, anymore than I can judge you guys by your boss. Now _there's _a grizzly if I ever sawone! And much as I think I'd like to have ya on my team to harass and abuse, I'd just as soon not have that grizzly bear after me for luring you out of his den."

"So you're just here to feed me."

"Got the day off, kinda bored, thought you might be, too. Thought after lunch we could catch the National's game. Think they're playin' the Marlins."

"Baseball? Yeah, sure, but-" He pointed to his right foot. "-not sure if you want to drag this along with ya. Might get crappy seats."

"We'll see. Let's eat lunch, then we'll take a ride to the stadium. And no eating the horns while I'm cookin' or I'll break yer arm to match yer leg."

"You sound like Gibbs, imagine that! Guys like you invented 'tough love', no doubt about it. The man doesn't know any other way."

Fornell turned to Tony, a serious look on his face. "He does the best he knows how, Anthony, especially with you."

"What's _that _supposed to mean, that I'm unteachable?"

Fornell saw the flash of doubt and anger across Tony's face and hurried to sooth the young man. "It means he works extra hard on you, Tonio, 'cause he wants the best for you, and knows you can _be _the best. He's never taken to any agent on his team like he has to you, you must knowthat! Not even Burley, and the guy lasted five years with him!"

He turned back to stir the alfredo sauce. "Burley was a good agent, and smart, that's why he lasted so long. But he didn't click with Gibbs like you do. Not sure why; let's just say it's surprising to most of us who know him. And even more so to Jethro. It scares him to be that attached to a kid again, he..."

"Again? I thought you said Burley-"

"Not Burley. Burley wasn't as young as you when he landed on Gibbs's doorstep."

"Oh. Kelly," Tony responded quietly. "I – I don't think you have to worry about that, I'm a long ways from what Kelly was to him."

"Hmm. Yeah, maybe."

"No maybe about it, and I don't intend to even _try _to pretend to fill her shoes. It's not fair to her and especially not fair to him. He's a good boss, and he's been a good mentor, but I'm not asking for more than that from him. I work for a _federal _agency, not an adoption agency. Besides, one father is all I can handle. And sometimes not even him."

"Bit of a tyrant, is he?"

"Yeah," Tony replied noncommittally as he peeked inside the pastry bag holding the cream horns. Fornell turned to start grilling him about his answer, only to find him eyeing the desserts, and smacked his hand.

"You stop now or we don't go to the game."

Tony flinched, not expecting to get caught in the act, or for Fornell to care. He took his hand back, rubbing it, and Fornell went back to his cooking.

"Little more 'tough love, enh, Tobias?"

"Just means we care, Anthony." He set the pan of noodles in the sink basin. "Drain the pasta, the sauce is almost done. Take your time, don't want you doing a face plant into the counter top."

Tony wordlessly did as he was told, maneuvering on his crutches and trying to absorb all that Fornell had been telling him about his place in Gibb's life.

"You still sulking for me slapping your hand?"

"No, no, I – I was just thinking," he answered, straining the pasta water out into the sink, "About what you were saying about Gibbs about him wanting the best for me. Sometimes I want to believe that, sometimes I even do, but…even if he did, if the day ever came that he didn't…I couldn't handle it."

It was quiet for a long while, and for almost all that time, Tony thought maybe Fornell hadn't heard him over the clatter of pans and water draining, or maybe he didn't understand what he'd tried to say. He didn't know why he'd said it anyways, was wishing he hadn't, and was fervently hoping now that the older man hadn't heard him.

Finally, Fornell took the pan of strained pasta out of the younger man's hands and gave him a hard, uncompromising look.

"You ever know Gibbs to give up on anything? To walk away from anything that he started? Burley walked away from Gibbs, and Gibbs gave him a handshake and a 'Congratulations, buddy, good luck!' _You _try walking away from Gibbs and he'll hunt you down and tell ya where the bear shit in the buckwheat! You ask him to tell him why and he won't be able to. He'll just say you belong to him until he says you don't. Which will be never."

"Jesus, Tobias, you make him sound like a Mafia don! He's _not, _is he? 'Cause he can be pretty damned persuasive when he wants to be and it would explain his-"

Fornell stilled him with a hand to his forearm.

"He's not with the mob, Tony, c'mon, don't be stupido! You know what I'm saying! And if you don't, I really don't know how to explain it to you. Let's eat, we got just over an hour to get to the game and in our seats. Sit down, slice us some bread, I'll set the table."

About forty-five minutes later, Fornell had the kitchen cleaned, Tony had a platter of fettuccine ready for Gibbs to re-heat, and slices of bread waiting in plastic wrap, and they were out the door and headed to the game.

"Better call yer boss and tell 'im where we're going. He'll get home and think you got kidnapped and be calling me to put out an APB on ya."

"Nah, he won't care, he'll be glad I'm gone..." DiNozzo retorted in a serious tone.

"For the love of God, DiNutso, no wonder he drinks so much bourbon! He won't be -"

"Chillax, T.C., I left a note with the fettuccine, he'll know exactly where I am and who I'm with!" DiNozzo looked over to see a totally riled up Fornell and chuckled happily. "That's pretty funny that your initials are T.C., cause T.C. Is Thomas Magnum's buddy, owns the helicopter that Magnum commandeers lots of times. So that must make me Magnum, right?"

"I was thinking more along the lines of Zeus or Apollo, but to each his own."

**. . . . .**

Gibbs had been surprised at how productive he had been in the bullpen not having to entertain a desk-bound DiNozzo and not having to worry about him left to his own devices at home. He'd gotten a month's worth of backlogged paperwork out of the way, and had even had time to have a leisurely chat with Director Morrow. Still, he had missed the amiable SFA and his chatter, and actually looked forward to having dinner with him after work. So he was a bit disappointed to find the note telling him where his house guest was, but he had to chuckle at the fact that Fornell of all people had taken him to the National's game. The kid would clean out the Fibbie's wallet for concession food.

Warming up a plate of noodles alfredo and buttering the sliced Italian bread, he mused on the fact that maybe Fornell didn't have an ulterior motive for keeping DiNozzo company for the day other than wanting company himself. Gibbs knew more than anyone how enjoyable Tony was to be around when he wasn't covering his emotional ass in front of the rest of the world. For one thing, he didn't talk as much, didn't feel the need for the constant distraction his often vapid chatter provided. And perhaps even better, he listened more, enjoyed the other side of the conversation more. Or maybe it was just that Gibbs had things to say that DiNozzo wanted to hear. It didn't really matter to Gibbs. When it came to getting the job done, Gibbs couldn't find a better investigator – but personally, he liked Tony better _off _the clock, when the younger man could be more himself and not so much the flim-flammer.

His thoughts had wandered during the work day to what it would be like to never again be able to look across the bullpen and see his second working at the ever-paper strewn desk, and he would think of the dream he'd had the last several nights, and would probably continue to have on occasion for many years to come.

The night that Tony had been pitched out of the plane, Gibbs had hardly slept enough to have any dreams at all. It was the next night, when he'd slept on the living room couch, that he'd been exhausted enough to fall into a deep sleep, and consequently, relive in his nightmares the horror of that fateful decision he had made for Tony and himself to join the jump crew on their maneuvers. The dream always started out the same, someone pushing a violently protesting DiNozzo out of the airplane door, with Gibbs hanging out the same door, heart pounding, waiting for his SFA's chute to open. The rest of the dream ended in various ways – the chute opened, but Gibbs finding a mangled and dead Tony at the drop site. Worse were the ones where the chute never opened at all. But this morning before waking for work, he had had a dream altogether different than the rest.

_DREAM FLASHBACK_

_The week had been a long and difficult one for Gibbs, having had to bring in a Marine who had lost control while drunk and put his young son in the hospital after a brutal beating. The man had been at loose ends for several months, coping with the loss of his wife and now sole custody of his child, but Gibbs could still find no excuses for him. He himself had had some rough times after the loss of his own wife, but he never once considered taking it out on his innocent son. And that son was one who often pushed him to his mental and emotional limits on a fairly regular basis._

_Like last week. He had gone out to the back yard to check on his nine year old boy, and found him diving off the swing set using a piece of old nylon curtain for a parachute. He had no idea how many times the boy had made this jump without him seeing it, but this time Tony saw him out of the corner of his eye, and startled at what he knew was probably going to be a bawling-out, lost his concentration just before jumping and landed badly, his left leg swinging out to catch himself in a last-ditch effort to stay on the wooden swing set. _

_His right leg crumpled beneath him, and Gibbs could hear the crack of a bone from where he stood transfixed on the patio. It all happened in a matter of seconds, his mouth open to yell at his son to stop, Tony looking up at him wild-eyed and then losing his balance, and crashing to the hard ground below. The scream from his boy's mouth tore him out of his frozen state and sent him top speed to Tony's side._

_"Easy, baby, easy, it's alright, daddy's gotcha, we're gonna get right in the car and take you in to the emergency room, I'm just gonna grab the keys."_

_"No-o-o-o, daddy, PLEASE, no hospital, PLE-E-ASE!" he begged, hugging his dad hard around the neck. Gibbs knew all too well why his boy hated the place, having visited his mom there before she passed away; it was a place neither ever wanted to return to, but times such as these left him no choice._

_"Baby, we HAVE to, you broke a bone in your leg, I heard it snap, and you can't not have it taken care of, like a cut or bump. I'll call Grandpa Ducky, he'll meet us there and take care of it for you, here, let me wrap you in this blanket, yer starting to shake a little."_

_"Hurts, daddy, can't help it!"_

_"I know, baby, but Daddy and Ducky will make it stop hurting, I promise."_

_He leaned down and kissed Tony's forehead, hoping to comfort even if just a little._

_"You'll be fine, buddy, just hang on for a little bit longer," he promised as he carefully loaded him into the front seat and belted him in, turning his little form to face him and put his legs up on the seat between them. Tony stifled a scream when his right leg was moved, and Gibbs nearly burst into tears himself, but he couldn't let the leg hang off the edge of the seat. _

_"I'm so sorry, baby, daddy's sorry, I had to move your leg!" he apologized miserably, misty eyes imploring his son to understand._

_"It's okay, daddy, just drive, I need the pain to stop now!"_

_Gibbs nodded and grabbed his cell, punching Ducky's speed dial number in his left hand as he started the car with his right and pulled out of the driveway. His hands were shaking, mostly from hearing his son scream in his ear when he'd moved Tony's injured leg, and his voice shook, too, when he finally got to talk to Ducky. It had been years since Tony had seen his father this upset, and it was a sight he couldn't handle much longer, so he calmed himself and steeled his own voice._

_"Daddy, don't be upset, it's okay, I'm fine. I was just scared at first, but I'm okay now! It just hurts a little bit!"_

_Gibbs looked down at the little boy, and going by the off-green color of his face, knew damned well it didn't hurt 'just a little bit'. His chest surged with pride, even though his heart hurt at the little boy's pain. He knew what Tony was trying to do, knew he had to calm himself down and be the stronger of the two. He was the daddy, after all, and he wasn't the one hurting, physically, anyways. Gibbs took in a long, steady breath and blew it out, then gave his boy a smile._

_"Okay, buddy, that's good. We're almost to the hospital anyways, and Grandpa Ducky will be there to help us. When he's all done, we'll stop and get ice cream sundaes on the way home."_

_Tony hitched a sob that was desperate to escape no matter how hard he tried, and nodded his head, strands of silky sun-bleached hair swishing in his damp eyes._

_"Atta boy, buddy. Hang in there. It'll be better in a little bit."_

_Better turned out to be several hours by the time Ducky could get them into the x-ray lab and the assisted the technicians in applying a cast to Tony's ankle. It was a bad break, and something he would have to be careful with for several weeks, even after the cast was off. A nurse had given the boy a mild sedative to take the edge off the worst of the pain, and Gibbs had re-wrapped Tony in the old blanket before taking him home, rocking him and reassuring him that they WOULD have ice cream later. Tony snaked a sleepy arm around Gibbs's neck and snuffled into his ear._

_"What were you trying to do with that old curtain anyway, bud?"_

_"Tryin' to...jump like those men...yesterday... the ones you took me to see on the...on the base...wanted to...fly like them."_

_"Hmmph, well, you FLEW alright, just not the right way."_

_"You startled me and I lost my balance."_

_"I know, baby, and I'm sorry about that. Still, it's something you need to wait until you're bigger to do and have more experience in. It's dangerous, even for guys that are TRAINED to do it."_

_"Yeah, I know that now...won't do it again, I promise."_

_"Tony, just because you see someone ELSE doing something doesn't mean -"_

_"I KNOW, Daddy," Tony sobbed pitifully, "I didn't think jumping a couple feet off the swing set was dangerous!"_

_"Well, I guess normally it wouldn't be," Gibbs agreed soothingly. Both of them were well pushing their emotional limits, he knew, and it was best to not strain them any further. "Doesn't matter now, let's go get some stuff for sundaes, we'll make our own and put whatever we want on them."_

_Tony nodded wordlessly into Gibbs's neck, and they headed for home, with Ducky assuring he would come by before bedtime and check on his young friend. True to his word, Gibbs stopped at the grocery store, a groggy Tony plastered onto his shoulder as he picked out the ice cream and all the toppings. He decided they would both lie down and take a nap when they got home, and have the sundaes for dinner, and Ducky found them sleeping on the couch as he crept in a few hours later and left a set of child-sized crutches and some mild pain relief prescription._

_END DREAM FLASHBACK_

"Hey, Duck, what're you doin' here?" Gibbs asked, looking up from his nearly gone fettuccine and bread. "Siddown, have some pasta. Tobias made it, it's great."

"Indeed! Is Tobias here now? I don't see his car."

"Took Tony to a National's game, they should be back shortly."

"I _see! _Well, that was certainly good of him to keep the boy occupied while you were at work. Still, that's a good amount of hiking about for him in that cast."

"Enh, I'm sure Toby took it easy on him."

"I certainly did!" Fornell's voice carried through from the front foyer as he and Tony made their shuffling way to the dining room. Ducky assisted his young patient into a chair, and proceeded to give him a quick check-over, much to Tony's chagrin and Gibbs's approval. Fornell made his way to the other end of the table and heaved himself down with an audible huff.

"Even on crutches he's hard to keep up with!" he complained loudly. "And the boy sure can _eat!_"

"Told ya I wasn't that hungry, Tobias! You insisted."

"Figured you'd be full after the fettuccine. Didn't know you could still eat a full-course meal."

"Growing boy, Tobias." Gibbs winked at DiNozzo, who gave him an odd look back.

"Yes, well, this 'growing boy' needs to use the 'little boy's room'. I'll be back."

The three watched him amble off, making good time with his crutches. They all knew he had way too much experience in using them by how handy he was with them.

Gibbs looked at Fornell expectantly, as did Ducky.

"Got the suite at home plate. Friend of mine lets me use his pass when he's out of town. Fast track parking, elevators, bar, huge buffet. Kid had a ball. _Boy, _can he eat!" Fornell reiterated, and then caught the knowing glint in Gibbs's eyes. "You're welcome for the dinner, by the way. And the, uh, riding herd on your house guest. I've gotta go, this weekend's my turn with Emily, gotta get things ready for her. Tell DiNutso it's been fun, but no more dropping out of C-130s in the middle of the night."

"Hell, Tobias, who knows what he'll do next if it means you take him to see the game in the luxury boxes. And thanks for the dinner and the herding. I'll take it from here, and he'll be back to work by Monday."

"Good to hear. Goodnight, Doctor Mallard. See ya, Jethro."

They watched the man head out the door, then smiled knowingly at each other. For the first time in a long time, Fornell had seemed to lighten up from his usual take-no-prisoners persona, just from spending the afternoon with DiNozzo. Who would've thought?

"Well, I'd best be going myself, need to check on Mother before I head home. He seems to be just fine, Jethro, if a bit worn out from his busy day. I suggest an early bedtime."

"Yup, he'll be parked on his couch soon as I can get 'im there. He'll read for a while or watch a movie, then he'll be ready to head up to bed."

Gibbs got up from the table to see the M.E. to the door.

"Do make sure he gets plenty of rest this weekend. He really needs to be at the top of his game when he starts back Monday, otherwise he'll be-"

"I know, Duck, he'll be ready. Thanks for stopping by. See you Monday."

"Yes, alright then, give Anthony my regards."

"Will do, Duck. Goodnight!"

He closed the door and watched to make sure the older man was safely in his car and down the street before he turned to find DiNozzo making his way towards the basement.

"Gonna go read for a while, Boss. Comin' down too?"

"Yup, I am, just wondered if you wanted an ice cream sundae before we head down there."

Tony's face brightened considerably at the mention of ice cream and he wobbled back to the kitchen.

"Yeah, Boss, always! I didn't have any dessert at the buffet, ate too much shrimp and Swedish meatballs...What do you have for fixings, got any of that marshmallow sauce left? You know, it was fun going to the game with Tobias today, but maybe sometime you and I can go, you know, just regular seats and hot dogs and popcorn..."

Gibbs listened to Tony ramble on while he got out the makings for the sundaes, surprised at how much he didn't mind the chatter, and thinking how easily it could have been silenced permanently those few days ago. He knew he couldn't keep his SFA from all harm, and finally had reconciled himself to the fact that the whole shove-out-of-the-plane-door and resulting injuries had not been his fault. He _did _still wish he'd been there for Tony as soon as he'd hit the ground, the thought of him in pain and struggling alone in the dark and cold rain making his guts twinge every time he thought about it.

In fact, the entire incident seemed to bother _him _more than DiNozzo, which bothered Gibbs even more when he contemplated that little discovery, making him wonder why his SFA was so like Teflon, and why his own armor coating was starting to get a little holey in places. But then, if the dour Fornell wasn't immune to the kid's mix of charm and vulnerability, then he couldn't expect himself to be. The kid was dangerous, on so many levels.

_Well_, he mused_, it's too late to take him back to where I got him_.

He'd been damaged now and was past his two year warranty. Gibbs would just have to keep him around.


	5. Chapter 5

**Thanks to Sparkiebunny for the chapter 4 beta, whom I neglected to thank last time around, shame on me! And thank you all who reviewed/favorited/followed, sorry if I missed anyone for a pm. This chapter is based on the 'Chained' episode; again, a good whumping gone to waste, along with a pretty nasty remark from Gibbs at the end. So in my universe, Tony gets whumped a little harder, and Gibbs doesn't give him any snark, at least not when he pulls him out of the car. AU/OOC.**

* * *

Gibbs had refused to admit it all along, every time Kate asked him if he wasn't worried for Tony, and assured him that it was _okay _to be worried about him; like he could keep the kid from getting hurt or killed just by stating the fact that he hadn't lost an agent on his watch yet and didn't intend to have DiNozzo be the first. But he couldn't admit it, _wouldn't _admit it in front of Kate, because then she would understand that there was a legitimate reason to be worried, to be scared for Tony. Truth was, he was scared _shitless _for the kid, especially since he'd been told, _way _too late, that his agent was on the run undercover with a serial killer, and not just a semi-harmless accomplice. And worse still, his agent had no idea who he was running with.

So he stuffed it down, hard, until he wanted to scream at Kate that, Yes, he was so goddamned scared for him he could throw up his last three cups of coffee.

But fear didn't work for him like that. He let it drive him from the inside, but he couldn't let it dominate him on the outside. Years as a Marine had taught him how to manage fear in the worst imaginable situations. Situations just like this. He had a job to do, and if he had to keep analyzing how he felt every five minutes and relaying that information to his probie, they'd be finding Tony garroted and possibly gutted before they could stop Jeffrey White, the whack job he was running with.

In the end, with some help from the techno-geek McGee pinch-hitting from the field office in Norfolk, they had tracked down his wayward SFA and the madman he was keeping company with, just as the two had reached their destination: a parking lot with a storage pod holding the Iraqi antiquities worth millions. But not before damage had been done, and approaching the bloodied-on-the-inside get-away car, Gibbs found his legs shakier than they had been in years. Weapon drawn, he had no intention of bringing Jeffrey White in alive if the bastard was still breathing, not if the blood on the inside of that car belonged to Tony.

And if for some reason White wasn't dead in that car, and had managed to elude them, he would hunt the son of a bitch down with extreme prejudice, with or without permission from the powers that be. He had done it before for Shannon and Kelly, he would easily do it again for Tony, someone who had become family to him in spite of both of their initial misgivings about it. Gibbs knew Kate was behind him, but if DiNozzo was in that car, massacred like his last victim had been, there was no way he was going to let her see that, remember him like that. He'd ordered her to back off, and wait for his signal whether to follow and assist him or go wait for Ducky in the car.

When he'd opened the driver's side door, his heart all but stopped in his chest at the sight of DiNozzo slumped over, nearly touching the steering wheel, his Sig still clutched in his hand. In the back seat he could see Jeffrey White, dead eyes wide in shock at having been on the wrong end of dead this time around.

_FLASHBACK_

_"Tony?" Gibbs reached a gentle but shaking hand inside the door to his senior agent's neck, cringing at the fresh blood he felt as he searched for a pulse. There it was, steady but weak, and now his legs shook with relief more than terror. "Need an ambulance, Kate, NOW!" he screamed behind his shoulder as he ran his hands over Tony's form, trying to figure out where the serial killer's blood ended and Tony's began. There, there it was, on the kid's shoulder, the blade of the knife impaled through the seat from behind. Son of a bitch, if the guy had aimed it just a few inches to the left - hell, he probably had, and Tony had moved to turn around and blow his crazy brains out._

_Gibbs yanked off his own coat and shirt, and used the polo to start staunching the flow of blood from the wound, tipping Tony back into the seat with his other hand._

_"Boss?"_

_"Here, Tony."_

_"Jeffrey?"_

_"You got 'im. He's not gonna hurt you anymore."_

_"Didn't want to..."_

_"Huh, well, not sure WHY, but I'm glad ya did anyways! Kate's got Ducky on the way, you'll be fine."_

_In reality, Gibbs had no idea how serious the wound was, but it was bleeding through the polo, and he knew Tony would need an ambulance, stitches, and a unit of blood at the very least. No way was he telling his hospital-phobic second that he was going there in an ambulance. He would leave that to Ducky, whom he knew Tony saw as the grandfather he could never say no to._

_"'Kay, Boss...jus' need some stitches, 'll be good t' go…"_

_"Yup, I don't doubt it, kid," Gibbs agreed quietly. "Just take it easy till then." Gibbs pressed his free hand against the back of Tony's head and pressed him into his chest, tightly enough to try to comfort him, but lightly enough not to smother him. He heard, felt, the younger man sigh hard, and knew if Tony were anywhere else and not out in the open, he would have collapsed in a heap against him._

_END FLASHBACK_

"Not your fault you didn't know who I was chained to, Boss," Tony told him quietly, trying to swallow down a protein drink Ducky had insisted on and grunting with the effort of finding a comfortable spot on 'his' couch in Gibbs's basement. "Not like _any_of us could have known."

"Then how'd you know enough to have your weapon ready to shoot the bastard in time?"

"Well, as you can tell by your ruined clothes, I didn't exactly _get _to him on time. It sort of came to me all at once, what was really happening. My skin started that crawly feeling and-"

"The hair on the back of your neck stood up."

"You got it. Felt that blade tip dig in just as I was turning to shoot him. Can we talk about something else, now, Boss, I…it's not my favorite subject."

"I'd be worried if it was," his boss assured him.

Gibbs had been sanding and gluing a spoon rack, his eventual contribution to Abby and Tony's pet non-profit organization, Habitat for Humanity, fundraiser. He went back to working on it, his legs gelling a bit at the thought of how he had found his youngest agent and the fact that he had been more than close to being too late to save him. It wasn't too long ago he was having the same feeling about watching Tony free fall from a C-130 and frankly, it was beginning to wear on him.

While he knew neither incidents were due to any negligence on DiNozzo's part, Gibbs couldn't help wonder if the kid was just a little too much of a shit magnet for his mental and emotional health. He was just now crawling out of the black hole that the loss of his first wife and child had inflicted on his psyche, and these two jarring episodes involving his senior agent and friend had made him realize just how emotionally invested he had let himself become in the young man.

There was _one _thing though, that he needed to ask Tony, no matter _how _'unfavorite' or sensitive the subject.

"Gotta ask ya though, kid, and I have a feeling Ducky already did, but…when you were at the cabin and those bastards had you vulnerable-"

Tony knew exactly where his boss was going with the questioning, and although he felt awful that the man had to even contemplate it, he loved him for it.

"Nothing happened, Boss. And yeah, it certainly did cross my mind enough times to keep me sleeping with one eye open."

"In other words, you never slept a wink."

"Pretty much, yeah. And no, not sure what I would have done if either of them had tried anything, but - I'm pretty sure neither of them had any sugar in their tanks."

"Not always about being gay, Tony. For guys like that, it's a power and control thing."

"Know that, Boss. Had enough experience dealing with that sort of mentality when I was a cop. Won't go into all the names I got called by guys who were supposed to be watching my six. They knew I wasn't gay, they just figured it'd get to me worse than being called a daddy's boy. Or Rich Boy. Or...well, you probably get the picture."

Gibbs eyed up his second, trying to read his body-language as to what had really gone on in Peoria and Philly and for sure Baltimore.

"You ever have to deal with anything worse than name-calling from any of them?"

"_Oh yeah, _and before you grab your sniper rifle and go a huntin', you don't need to, I took care of it myself before it got out of hand."

"Put your weapon down their throats and tell 'em to give you a reason not to release the safety?"

"Nope. Dug up the worst dirt I could find on every one of them and kept copies in a safety deposit box. They never stopped to think that I might have made at least a _few _friends in my supposedly pathetic life that were willing to get their hands a little dirty for me. Well, let's just say their hands were _already _dirty, and they owed me favors."

Gibbs broke into a proud grin, already knowing what Tony had done. You couldn't have grown up Italian on Long Island and _not _known some 'family' there, or worked the streets of Peoria and Philadelphia like the kid had done and not had made some connections to the mob either through informants or undercover work.

"You sicced the Mafia on them."

"Sicced is such a hard word, Boss, as is Mafia. Let's just say I made a few social calls and dropped a few names to some people who could make things happen. Honestly didn't want to resort to that, wouldn't have if they hadn't turned into a mob of frontal lobotomy patients and cornered me in the locker room. Someone off-duty guys came in to work out and they had to back off. Got out my little black book and took care of it from there. They were sweet as peach pie to me for the rest of my time there."

"Guess I'd better be careful how far I push you, don't want a visit from some Guido in the middle of the night."

Tony laughed around his drink, choking and nearly spitting it out, some of it going up his nose.

"Oh man, Boss," he coughed, wiping his mouth and nose, "do you know how nasty it is to have this stuff go down a second time?"

"Sorry. Had to be said."

"Yeah. Just like your question had to be asked. Anything else you wanna know while we're on the subject so we can close the book on it and never mention it again? Ever?"

Gibbs was quiet for a bit, but Tony knew he was just mulling something over, trying to phrase a question or comment in a way that didn't send the SFA into self-imposed silence for the next three days.

"Back at the car, when we first got to you and you said you didn't wanna hurt him...he was a god damned _monster, _Tony, why would you…what made you even _think _to hesitate killing him, for even a second?"

"Well, I _didn't _hesitate for even a second when I all of a sudden realized what he intended to _do _to me, I'm not _that _much of an idiot. I just meant that I wished he hadn't turned out to be what he was, Boss. I - don't get me wrong on this, but - I related to him in a way, before I realized what he was. I wanted to help him, you know, maybe get him a lighter sentence if he turned himself in and told me where his partner was. Didn't have any idea he was lying in a ditch with his throat slashed."

Gibbs's gut tightened at that last observation. For as long as he lived, he would never completely get over searching the property around that cabin after finding the box of bloody rags inside, jaws locked in near terror at the thought of discovering Tony's long-cold body somewhere on the grounds. In those moments, he could no longer keep his anxiety from Kate. It radiated from him in waves, and he thought for sure he was going to vomit from relief when he tore back the old tarp, pretty much expecting to find his SFA's dead form beneath it, to find a motorcycle hidden there.

Then they had found the garroted partner, and it was only a partial relief to either of them. If this man had been sliced ear to ear and left for them to find, Tony's chances of ending up the same way before this screwed up op was through were just as high. Gibbs had had to struggle to pull his heart of his throat and stuff it back down into his chest, where at least he could breathe half way decently again.

"Don't know what you mean by that, " Gibbs grated. "Pretty sure I don't really want to, but if I had got to you guys earlier, I would've blown his head clear off for putting us through what he did."

"You were worried about me, Boss?" Tony turned to him with his brilliant, patented grin, hoping to steer his mentor off the dark path he had suddenly started down. Gibbs read it for what it was and ignored it. He'd be damned if Tony made light of the situation in any way, or worse yet, made excuses for the bastard who had nearly killed him. Gibbs knew he was the one who had started the whole conversation with his need to find answers that DiNozzo was never going to offer up of his own volition, but he wasn't going to back down now that the can of worms had been opened.

And _hell yeah, _he'd been worried about the kid. For all of Tony's skills at hiding behind masks for undercover work, interrogating suspects, or just as often, keeping the real DiNozzo a secret from the world, he never acted as if he realized Gibbs did the same thing. Using the second B for bastard persona had gotten the Gunny untold information and access to what he needed to solve his toughest cases, and kept non-friendlies from prying into his personal affairs. It also saved him valuable time yapping with everyone. _That, _he left to his second. But it didn't mean he wasn't capable of strong emotions other than anger and impatience any more than DiNozzo, who also kept his under lock and key.

Still waters ran deep, and the intensely private boy from Stillwater had become an intensely private man, more so after the death of his wife and daughter. And it pissed him off that Tony continued to think of him as being so shallow.

"Yeah, DiNozzo, I was worried about you! You were chained to a serial killer without me knowing where you were or being able to help you! When're you gonna get it through that thick skull of yours that I can have feelings about someone?"

Tony set his drink down, no longer interested in even trying to nurse it along, and fidgeted with the thick blanket Abby had made him use, his head down to his chest.

"I _know _you can have them, Boss," he admitted quietly. "I've seen the way you treat Abby. Just…not used to getting treated like that myself...takes some getting used to is all."

"How many kinds of bastard _was _your father, Tony? I mean, I know he wasn't all hugs and kisses, but-"

Tony sighed heavily, looking for all the world like he was finally going to give in and spill his guts.

"I was thinking of getting a tat, got any ideas what I should have done?"

"Jesus, Tony," Gibbs grouched, tossing his tools aside. "Get whatever you like, hell, get one to cover up the scar on your shoulder, why dontcha?"

Tony kept silent and let his boss rant without words, completely used to eruptions like this as Gibbs slammed away tools and cleared the workbench. His father's had been much worse by comparison, and often simmered on for days with no apparent cause other than that his son had had the nerve to still be there every morning at breakfast. Minutes, perhaps hours, went by as Tony pretended to read his book, but his hands and jaw shook with clenched emotion. He was still reeling from lack of sleep and the unraveling of his nerves from the less than stellar undercover op. Gibbs's silent fuming wasn't helping, and really, what had he done other than refuse to rehash something that was better left buried? When had pointed questions about his near-fatal pairing with Jeffrey White, which he _had _answered against his better judgment, become a tell-all about his miserable old man and childhood?

Finally Gibbs ended his mute tirade by heading up the basement stairs with a quick "I'll be back" thrown over his shoulder, and Tony sighed with a mixture of exhaustion and relief. Gibbs _could _have feelings for him, and they seemed to be almost always bad. He just didn't know how to behave around the man, or what the hell Gibbs wanted from him. Less than ten minutes later, the older man was back, a couple of beers and a pastry box in hand.

"Forgot about Kate leavin' these," he announced, plopping the box down on the banged-up coffee table and sitting down next to Tony. He popped the caps off the beers and handed one out to the younger man.

"What? Just like that?" Tony looked up at him with stormy eyes. "You bring me a beer and donuts and I forget that you turned into my-" DiNozzo looked away, ignoring the beer held out to him. Gibbs didn't need to be a mind-reader to know what his second had been about to say, and he cringed inwardly, knowing Tony had been right. He leaned back against the workbench, setting down both beers and crossing his arms.

"No. Didn't mean it like that, Tony. I mean, I didn't get the beer and bear claws to try and smooth things over. Needed the beer for myself, figured I'd grab one for ya. And yer right, I was out of line with my pissy fit. I'm the one that's always yellin' at people to stay out of my private crap, got no right to make _you _dredge up demons."

"It's in the past, Boss. I mean, it's not that it doesn't affect me still, but it's done, I can't change it, I can't make it better; not by talking about it, or thinking about it in a different way, or wishing it never happened. I'm not the only kid to get treated badly by their parents. If there was a real club for it, I can't imagine what percentage of the population would qualify to join."

"Did anybody outside your family try to help you, try to get you away from them?"

"A few teachers tried. I wouldn't tell them what they wanted to know."

"Why in hell _not, _Tony?" Gibbs growled, then calmed when he realized he was out of line again.

"They were my _parents, _Boss. I may have led a sheltered life, but I knew there were even worse than _them _out there. I wasn't about to get myself yanked out of there, away from everything I ever knew to be put in foster care. It may have been wild and oh so crazy, but it was my comfort zone, my _home. _Things got out of hand there fairly often, but I still had a modicum of control ther. I could just go to my room or disappear somewhere on the property till things died down."

"Till the _next _time."

"Yeah, well, like I said, comfort zone." Things were quiet between them for a while, and Tony reached into the box for a pastry. "Why does it matter so much to you, Boss? It was years ago, and my father's been out of my life since I was, well, nine or ten, I guess."

"Just makes me nuts thinking about how a parent could treat their kid like crap and do all that damage."

Tony dropped the bear claw back in the box at Gibbs's last word, and the older man groaned to himself yet again at the fallen look on his senior agent's face.

"Ya know what, DiNozzo?" Gibbs queried as he turned to grab up his beer. "When we were looking for you, Kate kept insisting I let my feelings out, that she felt better saying she was worried about you, and that I would, too. I reached my limit with it and told her _that _conversation was _over. _And she shut up about it and let me think so I could do my job and find you. So _this _particular conversation is over, too. You ever wanna share any of your past with me, I'll listen and try not to go sniper after your father. Otherwise, it's none of my business."

"You're right, Boss, it isn't, but I appreciate the thought behind your interrogation – er - snooping. It's just that… it's not just you getting all crazy over how bad parents can be to their kids, it's…I always get the feeling when we talk about this stuff that you're trying to 'fix' me, and to tell you the truth, I want you to like me just the way I am, even if I _am _a little emotionally dented and scratched. Sort of like your fridge, it's banged up some but it gets the job done for you."

Gibbs couldn't help but break into a crooked grin at Tony's comparison of himself to Gibbs's refrigerator.

"Yeah, ya _do. _Ya hold a lot of food and beer like my fridge, too!" he chuckled, taking Tony's bottle back to him. "Just be careful Abs doesn't stick a butterfly decal on yer bare chest." He grinned again and tipped his own bottle towards the younger man. "And no, ya can't get a butterfly tat. If ya have to get one, find something a little less 'delicate', even Kate doesn't get butterfly tats. Talk to them, let them pick one out for ya, they'll raz ya about it, but in the end they'll come up with the right one."

"Mmmm, yeah, probably," Tony agreed, after chugging a swallow of beer.

"Not gonna get one, are ya?"

"Probably not, Boss. Got enough _accidental _ones on my body, don't really need to _pay_for another."

"Yeah. I think ya got enough of 'em, too, Anthony. Whataya say you make this one the last one?"

"Sure, Boss. Whatever you say. I'll go online tomorrow and order my very special agent knife-proof, bullet-proof, bite-proof field armor. Problem solved."

"Yeah, you _do _that, DiNozzo. I'll pay for it out of my own pocket."

"Or, I could just strap your refrigerator onto me and..."


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Thanks to my beta, Bunny!**

* * *

How the hell did this stuff keep _happening _to them? He had just gotten the kid back on his feet from the past year's screw-ups, only to have Tony carted off by another killer right in under his nose - and the odds hadn't been much better about him coming out of this alive than getting carved up by that bastard Jeffrey White.

_Did he get into this much trouble as a cop, or do I just keep putting him in risky situations he has no business being in? _Gibbs contemplated, trying to remember anything on his police department histories that compared to this. _Well, bringing down an entire mob family might come close, _he mused.

Nonetheless, this current goat rope of a situation should not have happened; sending an agent, however good he was at his job, to tail a suspect by himself was not only ethically wrong, but against protocol. And he had payed for his bull-headed determination to find a killer with an unmerciful fear clenching his guts the entire time Tony was gone, from the moment he'd heard the breathy, garbled '_Boss, I think I screwed up' _until he finally had the kid settled and sleeping on the basement couch. _Tony's _couch.

Gibbs had given up all pretense of being interested in sanding or sawing or any other 'ing' he usually did when he was hanging out down there with Tony. Tonight he'd decided to just give in to the wave, as Abby called it, and sit on the couch with his senior agent, watching him sleep off the exhaustion of the last two days and the effects of the cocktail of drugs in his system. DiNozzo had chattered non-stop after being checked over by their kindly resident M.E., still high on the adrenaline and narcotics in his system, and then—when finally established on Gibbs's basement couch with some blankets and pillows—had suddenly shut up and fallen asleep, as if the older man had yanked his batteries out.

When Ducky had left them, Gibbs was in the process of getting Tony situated on the couch, promising not to call his father, not to give him any more drugs, not to...the list of not to's was long, anything and everything that popped into the young man's head, it seemed. Gibbs and Ducky had directed Tony to the shower and exchanged his filthy clothes for general scrubs, both of them nearly gagging on the horrifying smell of death that clung to them, reminding them of what could have been. Once at Gibbs's place, Tony insisted on the pajamas that were kept there 'just in case' and it took Gibbs quite some time to get him clothed in them while Tony's arms and legs, and sometimes his entire body, refused to cooperate with him.

_FLASHBACK_

_"Tony, pay attention to what we're doing here, not gonna spend all night getting your pajamas on ya," Gibbs ordered impatiently, even though he knew his second really had no control of his uncooperative limbs._

_"S'ry, Boss, jus' - feelin' a little off here...sorry. These my flannels, Boss?"_

_"Yup, they're yer flannels, now put yer other arm out."_

_He was trying his best not to show his annoyance in front of Tony, but knew he was failing miserably. Since they'd gotten the young agent back to the Navy Yard, Gibbs had yelled at him twice and even head-slapped him once without thinking about what he was doing. Even Gibbs wasn't at all sure why he was so off-kilter. He should have been delirious that Tony had been found and was safe back with them, but he was still out of sorts, barking and snarling, even at the very person he'd been worried the most about. That I,s until he was brought up short for it._

_"Ya still mad at me, Boss? 'Cause I can go stay with Ducky if…"_

_Gibbs sighed as he buttoned up the front of the striped flannel PJs._

_"Not mad atcha, Tony. Mad at myself for letting you get hurt. Again."_

_"Not hurt, Boss, jus' -banged up a little...and reeeeaaaally out of it. I think Ducky gave me somethin' more than muscle relaxant."_

_"No, he didn't, kid. I made him promise not to 'cause I know ya don't like 'em. Lot of good it did ya, ya don't do any better on these than Percocet."_

_"Sorry..." Tony told him, barely audible._

_"Not yer fault, Tony. Sit back on the couch, I'm gonna go get ya something to drink. Want hot or cold?"_

_"Tea. Hot. Orange Pekoe. An' some toast...'n jam.."_

_Gibbs smiled to himself as he headed upstairs for the beverage, happy that Tony felt like eating something even if it was only toast. He had refused everything but water back at the Navy Yard, complaining of his stomach being 'queasy'. Well, hell, whose_

_wouldn't be queasy after spending all those hours with rotting corpses and thinking they may be next in line? It was more than the stuff nightmares were made of, and he'd be surprised if Tony could compartmentalize this latest fiasco well enough to not have night terrors the rest of his life._

_Not much later, he was back with a tray of tea and toast, slathered with strawberry jam he had picked up as in impulse buy from a local farmer's market. If he'd been forced to admit it, he would have said that he was thinking of Tony and his sweet tooth when he chanced upon it while looking for some apples. He found DiNozzo hunched over his phone, attempting to play a video game, but fingers not coordinating. Gibbs figured it was a pretty good bet his eyes and brain weren't working in sync, either._

_"Time for food, Tony, ditch the game."_

_Gibbs expected a rude grumble, but instead got a goofy grin._

_"Sure, Boss!" DiNozzo tossed the phone aside, as if it wasn't one of his prized possessions, and situated himself for his meal. He took one look at his toast and his eyes widened. "Boss, is that - real jam, I mean - homemade strawberry..."_

_Gibbs couldn't help a lopsided grin at not only his young guest's simple delight at the specialty food, but his ability to differentiate it from the cheaper store-bought product._

_"Yup, real jam, DiNozzo. And real tea. Ducky would be proud of us."_

_Tony's exaggerated groan of happiness when he took his first bite of toast made Gibbs's gut twinge, thinking how easily his SFA was pleased, and why it kept taking him getting hurt for Gibbs to show him a little comfort._

_"Ducky says I was reeeaaally lucky that you found me, 'cause even though I was, like, runnin' on adrenaline the whole time I was helpin' Atlas, my system was shutting down from the cocktail that the waitress...Va-NESS-aahh...made up for me...'cause I was too...the drugs were...my brain was fryin', Boss."_

_Tony took another big, joyful bite of the toast, and washed it down with a gulp of the tea, letting out a tire, yet contented sigh. Gibbs nodded dully, thinking back to the worry in the M.E.'s eyes when he listened to the young agent's heartbeat and checked his pulse and blood pressure. His guts clenched as he remembered thinking that they could still lose Tony after all, after their frantic search and Tony's heroic rescue effort, and how would he console Kate and Abby and not lose his own soul to loss yet again..._

_He shook off the past scene and rooted himself to the present._

_"Yeah, I know, Tony. Ducky said it'll take a while for them all to work out of your system. Remember he told you to drink a-"_

_"Lot of water and juice to flush my system out...that's funny, Boss, flushin' my system out after nearly dyin' in the sewer."_

_"Yeah, Tony," Gibbs agreed quietly, although not one cell in him found it even remotely humorous._

_He felt positively murderous towards the severely bent waitress who had drugged and kidnapped the young man, and if she wasn't already lying stone cold in Ducky's morgue with a toe tag, would have given his house to go a round or two with her in interrogation, cameras and sound 'conveniently' on the fritz. That computer hot shot McGee and Abby weren't the only ones who knew how to mess with electronics. _

_"Drink your tea. I left the kettle on the burner, there's lots more hot water for it."_

_"An' lots more jam, I hope. Lots of big pieces of strawberry...you should marry the woman who made this, Boss."_

_"Nahh...got three more jars of it, and she's at the market every weekend." He watched as Tony polished off the toast, and reached over to swipe damp hair out of the young agent's eyes and a blob of jam off the side of his chin. He would have followed through with a bear hug, but he knew Tony's ribs were bruised and scraped from being hauled over the rough pavement after he'd passed out._

_Besides, Ducky had warned him a few weeks back about showing Tony too much open affection, how it would scare him into a flight or fight response, and either direction would end badly. It made no sense to Gibbs, how this boy that craved attention and praise would run away or worse, bite the hands that hugged him. But Ducky knew things, could profile people even better than Gibbs and Kate, and Gibbs trusted him on things like this. Now he just had to figure out __why he had to take off the 'kid' gloves for DiNozzo._

_"Need a haircut, DiNozzo," Gibbs growled, trying to gloss over what he had just done._

_"Yeah, I know, Boss," Tony answered, looking anywhere but at Gibbs. "Been too busy lately. Kate and Abby offered to cut it for me, but...didden trust 'em not to shave me bald and tat somethin' on the back of my head."_

_"You __know they wouldn't really do such a thing to ya, dontcha, Tony?"_

_"Nope. Never had sisters before, doan' know how much is teasing and... how much is actual threats...I know I annoy 'em."_

_"Yeah, and they annoy you sometimes, and you annoy _me_ sometimes, and _they_ annoy me sometimes and I _sure_ as hell know I annoy _them_! Family annoy each other, Tony, doesn't mean they don't love each other."_

_Tony's head snapped up in shock at Gibbs's words and he trained glazed, tired eyes on the man._

_"__You love me, Boss?"_

_" 'Course I do, Tony. Why would you think I wouldn't? 'Cause you annoy me sometimes?"_

_" 'Cause you told Tim he couldn't have my job 'cause I was still alive," Tony admitted, his voice barely audible as he stared down into his teacup._

Crap. Chalk one more up for yourself for engaging your mouth before your brain,_ Gibbs chided himself._

_"That meant if you __hadn't found me, I actually would have been replaceable. You just told me I wasn't so I would shut up about it."_

Christ…leave it to me to turn an emotional goat rope of a situation into something even worse._ Gibbs clenched his teeth with the thought._

_"Meant what I said about you being irreplaceable, Tony," Gibbs admitted quietly. "Shouldn't have taken away from it by sayin' what I did to McGee. It was cruel, even for me."_

_Tony knew an apology from Gibbs when he heard one, reading in between the words and his boss's tone of voice, and with his current low physical threshold combined with the remaining drugs in his system was barely holding together - if Gibbs did or said one more gentle thing, he wouldn't be able to withstand it._

_"Just - not at my best right now, Boss, kinda - kinda hard to - keep the defenses up."_

_"Why do ya _need_ to, Tony? Can't ya just - relax a little when yer not at work? Let yer guard down around friends?"_

_"Can __you, Boss? Let yer guard down, I mean?"_

_"I just did, Tony. Apologized for runnin' my mouth without thinkin' how it would hurt you."_

_Tony contemplated what his boss was trying to tell him, struggling to wrap his brain around what the words could possibly mean. It was too much information, in too short of a space of time, when he was defenseless to try to not process it. Gibbs saying words like ' Love' and 'Family' and blotting jam off his face with his finger like Tony was a little kid getting a spit bath from his dad. It wasn't fair, and he wasn't going to sit there and take it._

_"Gotta - go home, Boss," Tony blurted, shooting up from the couch and spilling his tea, but even worse, nearly pitching over onto his head when it spun wildly and Gibbs's basement became a kaleidoscope of tools and fishing tackle and...whoa. "Gotta sit back down, Boss."_

Well, so much for the 'flight' part of it,_ Gibbs mused to himself. _Now for the fight part.

_"You okay, DiNozzo? Need somethin' for your head?" he asked quietly, helping Tony back onto the plaid sofa._

_"Need a - need to - " He closed his eyes and swallowed hard, waiting for the swirling behind his eyes to stop. Taking a breath, he sighed and rubbed his eyes, wishing like hell he could just to home and hunker down in his own bed right now. He'd already been through hell , and now Gibbs was apologizing? To him? And saying the 'F' word, and, and, the 'L' word? Maybe he was still lying in that sewer with Atlas and tripping out on the drugs in that drink…_

_"Need to what, Tony?" his boss asked softly._

_"You can't jus' KICK a guy when 'e's down, Boss!"_

_"How in the heck am I KICKIN' ya, Tony?"_

_"Stop callin' me 'Tony', Boss. My name is DiNozzo, not...not Tony."_

_"Kate and Abby call you Tony," Gibbs stated patiently, as if talking to a frightened child. "You don't tell them not to."_

_"Kate and Abby are...they're..."_

_"Friends? Family? Both. Just like me."_

_"I never asked you to be, Boss, and you can't just SAY that to people and not...not MEAN it, it's..." Tony heaved an exhausted sigh and fell back into the couch. "You just can't."_

_"Have I ever struck you as someone who doesn't mean what he says, DiNozzo?"_

_"N-no, Boss. Except you told Tim McGeek that he couldn't have my desk after all, which means you must've told him that he COULD have it if I hadn't - if you hadn't found me. Makes me - kinda think you'd...rather have him."_

Damn, _Gibbs swore to himself. He was going to regret that half-assed joke as long as he lived. Well, now was just as good a time to try to make things right with his SFA, when he was mellow enough to have it sink in. _

_He leaned into DiNozzo's space, squeezing the back of the young man's neck._

_"Look at me, Tony."_

_But DiNozzo kept skittish eyes anywhere but on his boss._

_"Anthony. Look. At. Me."_

_He could make it an order, even though he was using Tony's first name, and the full version of it, to boot. Tony knew he had to obey, every fiber in his being screamed at him to look at Gibbs, no matter how much his brain said otherwise. He lifted drug-clouded and bloodshot eyes up to his boss, and the man quirked a small, if sad, smile at him._

_"Never gonna replace ya, Tony. Don't care if you never learn to use a computer or type better than ya do now. Can't get out of a computer what I can get out of your heart and soul. What you've got can't be put in a program or hard drive or whatever the hell it is. You either got it or ya don't, and you've got it in spades. Didn't need Atlas tellin' me what a Marine you would've made; couldn't get 'im to shut up about how ya never gave up, dragged him out of there even though he knew you weren't in much better shape than him."_

_"No, Boss, I - he'd been there a lot longer than me, had a lot more torture than just some illegal drugs and some bumps and scrapes."_

_"May be, Tony, but you could've just sat there with him and waited for us to find you, and in the mean time, Vanessa would've killed all of ya. Anyways, not the point I'm tryin' to make here. I'm tryin' to tell ya that I would've never stopped lookin' for ya, and if we hadn't found you in time, I - well, wouldn't have mattered who was on the team, I would've retired and found somethin' to do way different than law enforcement."_

_"Really, Boss? You would've quit without me on yer team?"_

_"You goin' DEAF, too, Tony? Thought it was just yer brain screwed up from the drugs."_

_Tony looked away from his boss again, overcome again with emotion and not wanting Gibbs to bear witness to it. When he was finally able to speak, he spoke quietly._

_"Wouldn't wantcha to quit, Boss, yer too good at what ya do, an' -there aren't enough of guys like you,_

_anywhere." He kept his head down, picking at a snag on his sweat pants, but now there was a smile forming on his face, and he looked back up at Gibbs with the face of a mischievous child. "I know what you COULD do if you ever DID retire, Boss," he offered, the hint of a smile in his voice._

_"Oh yeah, and what's that, DiNozzo?"_

_"Well, more like THESE than THAT. I was picturing you working as a high school shop teacher, who coached football after hours. And - I don't know where they even have 'em anymore, but...you'd make a bitchin' Drivers Ed instructor. The examiners wouldn't know what hit 'em. All these hormonal teenagers drivin' on two wheels an' slammin' on the brakes an' swearin' at the other drivers.."_

_By the time he was done, Tony had gotten himself into a state of near-hysterical laughter picturing the consequences of his boss as a driving instructor to already anxious teens, and Gibbs had to tap him on the cheek to get him to calm down to finish their conversation._

_"Hey..alright already, DiNozzo, so I might get replaced after my first year, but I'd still have shop class and football. Not gonna happen anyways; when I retire, I'm gonna be coachin' YOU as team lead, with Kate as your SFA. You'll come here, I'll be workin' on who the hell knows what project, we'll talk about yer cases and maybe even yer wife and kids."_

_"Really, Boss? You'd hand me the reins when you retire?"_

_"Planned on it from the minute you set foot in this building, Tony. Then I ran into Kate on Air Force One and knew I had your SFA by the end of the case. No coincidence, I was lookin' for both of ya, and you both crossed my path at the right time."_

_"Katie's older 'an me, Boss. She'll wanna be boss."_

_"Won't matter. You've got seniority and more experience. She'll be fine with it, don't worry. You sleepin' down here tonight or in the guest room?"_

_"Down here, I guess, not so lonely here. Yer gonna be workin' on yer boat for a while, right?"_

_"Yeah, I will be, and I'll probably end up fallin' asleep down here, so that's fine. Gonna have more toast and jam?"_

_"No, Boss, my tummy's still off from, well, everything, I guess. But that was really good toast an' jam. Like my Grandy Paddington used to make."_

_"Need to brush yer teeth, then, and drink some more water before ya fall asleep."_

_"Boss, I'm already floatin'..."_

_"Yup, that's good, need to pee all that junk outta your system. C'mon, I'll walk up there with ya, need to get some more coffee anyways."_

_"'Kay," Tony murmured into his chest as they headed up the stairs._

_"Okay. We good now? You understand what I been tryin' to tell ya? When I say we're family, and that you're irreplaceable, that's just what I mean? Even if I made a bad joke about McGee...?"_

_" 's scary, Boss..never had a family, not a REAL one, anyways, an' it's too scary to think about right now."_

_Gibbs's heart cracked a bit at Tony's admission, and he vowed that when the younger man was in a better mental and physical condition, they'd have a nice, long talk about what Tony thought a 'real' family was._

_"I know, Tony," Gibbs quietly assured him. "We don't have to talk about it anymore tonight. All you need to know is that we have yer six, and you're not alone anymore."_

_"Dunno how to be in a family, Boss. Frat brothers don't really count."_

_"I know, Tony, don't worry about it, we'll help you figure it out."_

_He stood the younger man in front of the sink, found his extra toothbrush, and put it in Tony's hand, then went to get a glass from the cupboard. When he turned back around, Tony was still standing in the same place, staring at Gibbs, toothbrush clutched in his fingers. Gibbs couldn't stop the crooked smile from forming as he took in the sight before him. Tony's tousled, ungelled hair—some still hanging in his eyes—his flannel PJs…it all made him look years younger, and Gibbs's heart tugged at the thought of what might have been, had Tony been his to raise, flesh and blood or not._

_He could picture his stalwart and mouthy SFA as the mild and introverted child that he most likely was, and though he had no wish to change the young man now, he couldn't help but wish away some of the damage inflicted upon him during his childhood. He didn't know all of the details, but he knew more of them than Tony had told him, and the picture they painted was grim._

_Still, the man who stood before him had overcome that grimness, or at least had learned to deal with it and still be not only a highly functioning individual, but someone who had set a moral and ethical compass for himself that set him well apart from the man who fathered him. Sometimes Gibbs had to admit to himself that DiNozzo's compass was even truer than his own, and those were the moments he was most proud of the young man. He didn't need another Marine to brag on the kid to know Tony's heart._

_Gibbs handed him the cup and a tube of toothpaste from the drawer by the sink and turned Tony towards the sink with a hand on his elbow._

_"Brush. I'll pour my coffee and wait for ya."_

_"Sorry. Kinda - zoned out there. Think my batteries have finally run down," Tony mumbled, turning on the water and getting started with his task. Gibbs heard a startled grunt, and turned to see a large gob of toothpaste hanging from Tony's hand and toothbrush, and his SFA frozen mid-squeeze. "Sorry, Boss. Nerves are a little shot, too, I guess."_

_"Yeah, Tony, I know," Gibbs encouraged quietly, rubbing the younger man's shoulder. "It's okay. Morrow took us off rotation for a few days, you can stay here and read or watch yer movies or help me sand the boat, whatever the hell it takes to get you back on track. You'll feel better tomorrow when that crap is out of your system."_

_"Yeah, I know, Boss, just - can still smell the - you know...can't seem to get it out of my nose, it's hard to concentrate."_

_"Yeah, Tony. I know. I saw the crime scene. It'll go away eventually. "_

_"Maybe the smell, but...not the visuals...those men - no one knew where they were, they didn't know anyone was coming for them like I knew you were for me. That was half the battle, knowing you were looking for me. Those other guys didn't deserve to die like that just for being stupid and in love."_

_"I know, Tony. C'mon, get yer teeth brushed, let's get ya to bed. Abby and Kate will be here before ya know it with donuts and your favorite coffee. Let's get some sleep so we're ready for them."_

_Tony ran the water and finally started brushing while Gibbs leaned against the fridge with his coffee and patiently waited for him. It was a slow, fitful process, but Gibbs really wasn't in that big of a hurry. He was just glad to have his boy back safe and under his roof._

_"You think Ducky will stop over, too? Wanna make sure he clears me for duty when we're back on rotation."_

_"I'm sure he's plannin' on it, but I'll talk to him and make sure."_

_Tony wiped his mouth with the dish towel and waited for Gibbs to move, now so unsure of himself at this point. His body suddenly craved and begged for rest, and he just wanted to crash on his couch in the basement and sleep until Gibbs kicked him out. He felt his boss's firm hand on his elbow, directing him towards the basement door and carefully down the stairs to his beloved plaid sofa._

_"Sleep, kiddo. I'm just gonna sit here for a while and enjoy my coffee," Gibbs assured him while settling a couple blankets over and around him, then settling down himself at the other end of the big couch. He tossed his head back and closed his eyes with a sigh, knowing he was too wired to sleep himself, but needing to just rest for a little while._

_"Irreplaceable, Anthony," he stated quietly, rubbing Tony's feet through the blankets. "Always remember that."_

_"Yeah. Thanks, Boss," came the quiet reply, and then there was only the noise of their breathing for a while. "Boss?" Gibbs heard the hesitance in his SFA's voice and opened his eyes to look down at him. "We forgot something."_

_"Yeah, what's that, DiNozzo?"_

_"I didn't go pee while I was upstairs. Now I - I have ta go."_

_Gibbs threw back his head and laughed out loud at that. It was going to be a long night, but there was nowhere else he'd rather be. Still, if Tony was going to keep spending this much time down here, maybe he would have to seriously consider putting in a half bathroom in under the stairs._


	7. Chapter 7

**As per usual, this series is AU – I'm using Ari Aswari's character for my own plot device, it's not in canon.( I never liked the actual Ari story arc, but his character is very handy to 'borrow'! ) Tony is younger than Kate and Abby. Gibbs isn't so Gibbs-ish when it comes to how he treats his 'kids'. Most of the time, anyways... This is part one of 2-3 part story arc for this series. Not beta'd, still don't have a life yet, till I do, here's more fic, enjoy!**

As a member of the most elite team serving NCIS out of the nation's capital, Special Agent Caitlyn Todd loved her job, loved being able to put her profiling and Secret Service skills to use and learn new ones under the tutelage of her boss, LeRoy Jethro Gibbs. In fact, most days she couldn't wait to get to work. Today, however, wasn't one of them.

She had made a mistake, and she knew it the moment it happened, but in her job, a moment can be too late to keep someone from getting killed. And now, outside of an emergency room, her boss was letting her know just what he thought of her brief, but costly lapse in judgement. Her partner and friend, Tony DiNozzo was _inside _the emergency room, getting sutures and antibiotics and who knew what else after having a 'run-in' with the terrorist Ari Aswari. The man had nearly strangled Tony, and then once he was half-conscious, proceeded to beat the snot out of him.

She knew she could have prevented it, had she not hesitated that fraction of a second a few days before and shot the bastard through the head. Something had distracted her, startled her, for only a second or two, but it had only taken that long for him to disappear into a crowd of shoppers, and they lost him completely. Gibbs had let it go at the time, although she could see he was seething on the inside, and she thought that might have been the _only _reason he hadn't fired her on the spot – he was too consumed with fury to get a word out of his mouth. He'd walked away from her, circled the mall perimeters seemingly aimlessly, then gathered them up and driven back to the Navy Yard, fingers clenched so tightly around the steering wheel she thought he might break it.

He wouldn't tell them why he was so obsessed with the Mossad agent, even Ducky was at a loss to understand Gibbs' passion to find and end the man. As far as they knew, Aswari had never done anything to Gibbs, or brought harm to anyone he knew. As far as they knew, Gibbs had only ever talked to the man once, and for a brief few minutes. Tobias Fornell seemed to understand a good deal about both their boss's fixation with Aswari, and exactly what the man had done or said to Gibbs, but he wasn't offering even a hint about it. That the Fibbie and and the Lead NCIS agent were even more short – tempered with each other than usual, was plain to all of them - and Tony had told her that Fornell was keeping something big from Gibbs, and that their boss was going to snap any day now and they'd be prying his fingers from around Fornell's neck in the middle of the bullpen.

And there was something else besides worry concerning the wrath of Gibbs in Fornell's eyes – guilt. Tony noticed it first, in fact, he seemed to be the only who _had _noticed it. What could the Fibbie have possibly done to wear that look around the bullpen? It was starting to wear on the young agent, and he was going to get to the bottom of the whole, sordid situation. He was tired of Gibbs being on his last nerve, barking at him and giving him looks as weird as Fornell gave him, and he couldn't recall anything he had done lately to garner those odd, furtive glances, or his boss's shorter than even normal temper.

Maybe Gibbs was getting ready to fire him and Fornell knew and felt sorry for him.

Tony never had figured it out before they'd been called to a scene of a double homicide, and he had been surprised from behind by the feel of something hard and jolting poked into his spine. He knew all too well the feel of a handgun jabbed into his flesh, even through his jacket, and was not about to risk a scene that could get innocent bystanders hurt by making a play for the weapon. He let whoever was threatening him follow through until they were away from the public area, hoping one of his teammates would see him leaving with a stranger and catch on. But Kate had had her head down, sketching in her book, and Gibbs was hunched down talking to Ducky, and by the time they had noticed him missing, Ari Aswari had half-strangled him and used every bit of his Kidon training against Tony's Baltimore brawling. Tony was no match against the man as he could barely breathe properly, or see what was coming at him through his spotty vision.

And now he was feeling every bruise and boot print as he lay on the emergency room gurney being stitched and stung with antiseptic and unwillingly doped up while he listened to Gibbs screaming at Kate outside the door. He took an inventory of his bones and muscles, deciding which, if any, of them was in decent working order, and decided that other than whatever pharmaceuticals they had given him, he had certainly felt worse than this in his life. The doctor had examined him and left, waiting for Ducky to give their patient a once - over, and the nurses were busy typing out paperwork and finding some clean scrubs for him, so no one noticed when he slipped down from the table and headed out the door.

The expression on Kate's already shaken and pale face became indescribable when she saw Tony's half-clothed figure descend upon them, and Gibbs looked ready to go through the ceiling and every floor of the hospital above them when he turned to see who was standing behind him. But Tony barely noticed, or if he did, didn't take time to register the hardened jaw and flinty eyes.

"You stop now, Gibbs, or I swear to God I'll drop you where you stand."

Kate's watery eyes widened to saucer-like proportions and she gulped uncontrollably. Maybe she hadn't heard right; Tony wasn't able to talk very well what with a bruised windpipe and stitches in his lips.

"Tony?" Gibbs countered nearly as quietly, though due only to shock and anger than any injury.

"You need something?"

"You just heard what I need, Boss. You're wrong and if you keep _being _wrong, I'll make you feel like I'm feeling right about now."

Gibbs straightened at the threat, and put himself smack into Tony's face, not caring if the man in front of him was swaying and sweating and looking two seconds away from passing out from his injuries.

"Big talk from a kid who's ready to keel over from a stiff breeze."

"Gibbs, stop!" Kate ordered from behind him, trying to diffuse the escalating scene.

"Stay outta this, Kate, 's between Tony and me. Besides, I wanna hear what else he has to say to me about what he's been thinkin'."

If Kate hadn't been with Gibbs the last five hours, she would have sworn he was drunk from the way he was posturing and goading Tony. Unfortunately, he was just well and truly pissed at the world, which was even worse.

"I'm thinkin' you need to pull that tool called Ari Aswari out of your ass and start behaving like a half-way decent human being and boss again. Cause I didn't know that even _you _had it in you to treat Kate like yer treating her, and if you don't stop and think about what yer doing and saying to her, I'm gonna find a way to do it myself, and don't think cause I got a few boo-boos and some drugs in my system I can't! Ask my father what I can do when I'm really mad."

Kate swallowed hard again. She had never seen that look in her partner's eyes before, never heard that tone in his voice, didn't think he was capable of that kind of anger. Apparently, neither did their boss, because he took an almost imperceptible step back away from the younger man without taking his eyes off Tony's face, which was grim with a mix of pain and a look that said his patience with the man had reached an end.

"I don't think I will, Tony." Gibbs answered him quietly, in a voice that said he understood all too well just what his agent meant by that challenge, and reached out to touch his SFA, only to have Tony jerk away from him and hug the wall for support.

"Apologize to her, for now and for all week. You've been taking something out on us since we came back from Gitmo, and you know damned well she couldn't have unloaded her Sig into Aswari in that crowd of shoppers. One ricochet off a building or car and somebody'd be dead and it wouldn't have been Ari. You would've been happy that somebody's kid got hit just so you could see the man dead? That be worth it to ya, Gibbs?"

"You know damned well I wouldn't be happy -"

"Then _start _acting like it!" Tony barked, cutting him off. "Since when has Rule Number Ten taken a hike, or is it just for everybody else and not you?"

"You don't have any _idea _what's between Ari and me!" Gibbs grated, getting back in Tony's space again.

"And you know what, _I don't give a damn, _Boss! You got a problem with the guy you keep it by the books, you wanna go off – grid over him, you'll do by yourself, cause I'll be taking my vacation time all at once starting now, and I bet Kate'll be out the door right behind me taking hers till you and Fornell can get your acts together and start _leading _your teams again instead of running them into the ground! There are rules even if you -"

"Anthony David DiNozzo, what on _earth _are you doing out here, they couldn't possibly have seen fit to release you yet!" came Ducky's voice from a doorway a few rooms down from them. "Jethro Gibbs, if I find out you had a hand in aiding his escape, I'll -"

"Calm down, Ducky, nobody's escaping. DiNozzo and I were just having a little discussion."

"Discussion, my aunt's arse, I know very well what's been transpiring here, and it ends, now! _You, _Anthony, will turn around and go back into that examine room this instant before we are carting you off to intensive care instead of an overnight stay! And _you, _Jethro, will either go wait in the appropriate lounge or go back to the Navy Yard, I do not care which at this point! Caitlyn, you may wait with Jethro, although I do wish you would do me a favor and find us all a decent cup of something and some sandwiches from that deli down the street, I am done in from the stress of the last few days, as I'm quite sure you are."

Kate turned on her heel and strode away without a second look at her boss, anxious to be out of the man's sphere of negative influence. Gibbs getting a dressing down from both Tony _and _Ducky Mallard was more than even she could manage in one day. She knew that the gentle M.E. Would make sure that her partner was well taken care of and that their boss would either be cowed enough to behave and do as he was told, or get even angrier and head out of the place. Like Tony, she didn't give a damn right now, and like Tony, she was ready to take some extended vacation while Gibbs pulled his head out of his ass and got his priorities straight. Whether she had been justified or not in her holding fire against the terrorist Ari, she had not deserved the sort of treatment he had meted out to her since then. Tony had deserved it even less, but for some unfathomable reason, had been treated even more harshly than she, and she knew her younger partner had been on the verge of snapping, perhaps maiming Gibbs, or worse, quitting the team.

One way or the other, this was going to end. How badly depended entirely on their boss, who had actually followed Ducky's order to make himself scarce and deposited himself with a loud huff in a waiting room chair. Scraping his hands through his hair, he closed his eyes and tried to get some perspective on what had just happened. He had been yelling at Kate. Blaming her for Tony getting hurt because she had somehow 'allowed' a terrorist to 'escape' and he came back to finish the job of destroying Gibbs by killing Tony. Tony had heard him yelling, had probably heard Kate quietly crying, and had had enough of the man.

Well, truth be told, Gibbs had had enough of himself, if anyone had asked him at that moment. In his quest to end Ari and keep his youngest 'kid' safe, he had become a bullying, thoughtless madman, unable to process his and control his once buried and volatile emotions. He was a man who knew profound loss, and wasn't in the market to experience it again through the death of a young man who had become family to him, and that fear had driven him to new heights of bad behavior. Making Kate Todd cry? For Christ's sake, what kind of man _was _he that he could torment a woman as resolute as her to tears? Tony had come to her rescue, defending his big sister against a monster even when he himself was barely able to stand, and Gibbs had turned on him for calling him out for his appalling conduct.

It was time to call in some favors, and force Tobias Fornell to do the same, or he had no doubt that he would lose everything he had built with his team that had inadvertently become his new family. After that, he needed to clear things up with a few Tony and Kate, and if he needed to, apologize to them. They would understand, at least a little, about why he had treated them like he had, but he knew it didn't, wouldn't, negate his incredible nastiness to them. Granted, they were used to his often churlish and antagonizing ways, but even he knew that this had gone way beyond his usual bastardness.

He sighed loudly, exhaustion threatening to overtake him now that he was sitting, and not doing. As he was willing himself to get up and go find coffee of any caliber to prod him on, his cell rang. Fornell. Well, speak of the devil. One of them, anyways.

"Yeah, Gibbs."

"Found the bastard. "

"He dead?"

"Where are you?"

"At the hospital, waiting for Tony."

"What happened?"

"Is he dead?" Gibbs repeated, figuring that was more important at the moment.

"Meet me in your bullpen, I'm leaving for there right now."

Gibbs hung up, growling at the phone, but realizing that Fornell obviously didn't want to discuss the particulars of Ari Aswari's life or death over the airwaves, as he hurried out of the hospital and back to the Navy Yard. No one would miss him not being there after the rabble-rousing he had done, so he left without notifying anyone, and was gone before anyone realized he had stuck around in the first place.

Things would be better when he came back, things would finally be settled, and he could stop feeling that icy clenching in his gut every time he thought of that fateful conversation with the smug terrorist.

**FLASHBACK**

_He had been on his way for coffee, his usual mid-morning diversion that he took when the team was pushing papers or working cold-cases in lieu of a current case, and had felt, rather than seen, a presence following him. There were dozens of other people on the sidewalk, it was a popular stretch of shops and coffee bars so he would never expect to be alone, but the hairs on his neck were bristling, telling him that this was a different sort of 'company'. His old enemy Trent Cort, perhaps? Really, it could have been one of a dozen, several dozen even, after all of his Black Ops and NCIS undercover stints._

_He stopped abruptly, seemingly to check his watch, and his shadow stopped just as suddenly. Obviously someone well-trained, who could read his intentions by his body-language. He readied to walk on, but instead, spun around and reached out for the shadow, and didn't come back empty-handed. The stalker was male, in his thirties, dark features that spoke of Middle Eastern descent, but Gibbs held off making that call. The man's eyes were what Gibbs was immediately drawn to, and a chill ran through him. He'd seen that look in the eyes of people he had killed without regret, and knew in an instant this man would be added to their number. It wasn't something he could explain, even to himself, but perhaps more of a momentary leap into the future he was feeling, and let the sensation go as fast as it came to concentrate on the moment that was now._

"_What the hell do you want?" he growled, no doubt in his mind now that this man was tailing him for a reason, and he meant to find out what it was. He shook the man by the shirt front, earning gasps and stares from passersby, then grabbed out his badge with his free hand and showed it around for any and all to see. _

"_Don't shoot me, Agent Gibbs, I am just the messenger."_

"Don't count on it, buddy. Spill."

"A Mossad agent by the name of Ari Aswari wants you to know that there is a contract out on your team, the boy, in particular."

"_And what exactly does this Aswari scum have against 'the boy', that he wants him dead?" Gibbs _

_snarled, his face betraying nothing but his eyes glinting ferally. _

"_Nothing that I am aware of, Agent Gibbs. It's _you _he hates, quite passionately, I'm afraid, although I couldn't tell you why. Perhaps you killed his son or daughter during the Gulf War. Or during one of your shoot – outs here in the states. It is not for me to know. I'm merely the - "_

"Messenger, I know! Well, Mr. Messenger, you take a message from me to Aswari; he or anyone he hires touches Tony, comes within a hundred feet of Tony, even_**looks **__at Tony, __I will take him out with extreme prejudice. If he knows I was in the Gulf War, then he knows I can and __**will **__do it!"_

The 'messenger's' eyes lit with something akin to excitement, and for a moment Gibbs wondered if the man in his grasp was trying to get his 'boss' killed so he could take his place in the hierarchy of Mossad. Frankly, he didn't give a damn, all he cared about was figuring out who this Aswari was and ending him before he could hurt his agent. Gibbs gave the figure another hard shake and shoved him away from him, letting him fall backwards onto the sidewalk and walking around him. Instantly in his mind's eye, he imprinted the stalker's face and mannerisms, and would get Kate to sketch it for him to start looking for a match on their databases. Next, he would call Fornell, and shake him down for every iota of information he could scrape up on the bastard, and after Fornell, he would go on down the list of people who owed him and call in some of his markers until he got what he was after. One cold and dead Ari Aswari for Ducky's autopsy slab.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N:And now, back to finishing this languishing chapter. Thanks to all who reviewed/favorited last chapter. Thanks to PawPrintPajamas for the heads up on Ari's last name, never occurred to me I have been spelling it wrong; instant karma for stealing a character from a story arc I despised. And, Re: comment in review about Fibbies, not sure why it's inappropriate to use, thought it stood for just F – B – I personnel. Fibbies, or Feebies. I always thought of it as a less than endearing slang word for them the way that the gang at NCIS uses it. Next Fibbie I meet I'll ask.**

By the time Caitlyn Todd got back to the hospital emergency room loaded down with bags and cartons, her boss was nowhere to be found, and Ducky was just getting ready to settle her partner into a bed for an overnight stay. The mood was tense between the two men, something Kate didn't think was possible given their close bond, but when it came to hospitals and being poked and prodded, DiNozzo turned into a rather mutinous, cranky brat, and even the persuasive M.E couldn't sway him to behave better. This particular visit was even worse, given the extent of Tony's injuries and his combative mood stemming from his boss's overly-gruff treatment of Kate, and he continued to insist on going AMA until Ducky strong – armed him with the one word Tony couldn't resist from any of his surrogate family. A gentle _'Please, Anthony.'_ was all it took for him to fold and settle, letting the M.E dress him in the hospital scrubs and tutt tutt his various wounds and bruises.

Tony looked over to see Kate in the doorway, taking in every injury and stitch, and willing her stomach to stay down. Countless gruesome crime scenes seemed no match for seeing partner so brutalized, especially as she recalled how he had come to her defense against their boss and stood his ground with him, in spite of Gibbs' snarling back at him. If only she had been able to take a shot at that bastard, they wouldn't be here putting Tony back together again. She knew she was starting to think like Gibbs, and part of her was starting to understand why her boss had been so rabid. He was the one who had found Tony, and hadn't allowed her to see her younger partner before he had been loaded into the ambulance and taken away. Gibbs's face had been so unreadable as to be frozen, except for his lower jaw working back and forth that looked as if he was suppressing a scream to be heard in outer space.

Now she understood his ire at her, at everyone; now that she was seeing the footprints decorating Tony's torso, the stitches on his stomach, the bruises – God, the bruises, already forming in blue-black clouds all over his body – no wonder Gibbs had been literally fit to kill someone. She watched how gently Ducky placed the scrub top over Tony's head, being careful not to bump his facial stitches, and then handed him a glass of ginger ale, probably in an effort to settle a queasy stomach.

"You shouldn't be in here, Katie." Tony chided hoarsely, handing the cup back to the M.E and lying back down on the gurney with a quiet groan.

"Looking for Gibbs." she lied outright, setting down the coffees on a nearby chair. In truth she didn't give a rat's butt where the man was.

"Haven't seen 'im. Maybe I scared him away." He tried a grin through his stitches, but it was half-hearted, and made him wince.

"Uh huh. Maybe he went for a cruise in his boat, too. Can he have hot tea, Ducky, it's herbal."

"God, Kate, talk about adding insult to injury..." he croaked out.

"Anthony, what did I tell you about talking?" Ducky admonished with a wagging finger.

"Not to." Tony replied sullenly.

"We were just about to bring Anthony to his sumptuous accommodations, you may follow us with your tea and once we're settled, you may sit with him and drink. No solids for twenty-four hours for you, though, young man." Ducky squeezed Tony's shoulder, giving him a stern look that seemed like the doctor was reading the agent's mind about having take-out or pastries. "I doubt you would be comfortable eating them anyways with the bruising to your throat."

Ducky stated the last part lightly, as if he was talking about a football injury instead of another man trying to asphyxiate Tony and leaving finger marks around his neck, but the look in his eye as he pushed the wheel chair told Kate that the M.E himself might take part in the bringing down the man who had hurt his young friend. Kate was right behind him in his desire, and vowed to herself that no matter the circumstances, she would shoot Ari Haswari between the eyes the first chance she got.

While Kate Todd was thinking of ways to end the terrorist who had been in her sights, her boss was barely able to think at all as he drove towards the Navy Yard to meet with Fornell. He swore to God that if he got there and the man was giving him a song and dance about Ari's whereabouts, he would send the Fibbie through the plate glass window. When Gibbs had first contacted Fornell about the terrorist, he had gotten the classic runaround about need-to-know, and even if he could read Gibbs in on the situation, there was nothing either one of them could do about apprehending the man. Ari was being handled by the powers other than the Mossad, and to interfere in whatever op he was involved in would mean certain career suicide, perhaps even some sort of physical retribution. That alone told Gibbs how deep this guy went, that Fornell had to warn him about what was lurking in the dark behind Haswari.

_**FLASHBACK**_

The anger that had coursed through Gibbs when he'd found out who had shadowed him on his coffee run was palpable, his breathing sounding like an enraged bull, and for a moment Abby wondered if she needed to find a safe place under one of her lab tables. As soon as he got back to the bullpen he had had Kate sketch the face for him, and Abby had run it while he paced her lab and made a general nuisance of himself, never letting any of them know what had happened.

He had sent a thoroughly confused DiNozzo to go assist Ducky in Autopsy, with no stops for talking or flirting or any other 'ing', then immediately called the M.E and ordered him to find something quickly to occupy the young man indefinitely. The poor man was at a loss for not only what was happening, but how in the world he would be able to hold Tony hostage in his work quarters for any length of time. He decided suddenly that his small office needed a 'new look' and Anthony was the perfect one to help, given both his good decorating sense and abundant muscle.

Tony had given him the oddest look, and then a rather dubious one, which Ducky correctly read to mean _'does Gibbs know you're having me do this?'_

"You're quite safe from the wrath of your boss, Anthony, he has something else he's working on at the moment and won't need you for a bit, so he volunteered your services. I _do _hope you don't mind awfully, this poor room has needed a reworking for years and I've just finally lost my patience with it."

It was actually the truth, the room _had _needed a do-over, but the other truth was that Ducky rarely spent time in the place, so his impatience with it was a bit exaggerated. Still, it seemed to do the trick,

and Tony rubbed his hands together in anticipation and gave the cramped room a good, long inspection.

While Tony helpfully moved office furniture for Ducky, Gibbs had sequestered himself in Abby's office, not even letting _her _ inside the sound proof room while he made furious phone calls. Ten minutes after Abby had entered the data into her 'babies', the face of Gibbs' messenger had rung their bells, and the Lead agent stared hard at the information that came with it, his chest heaving with anger as he snatched the printed copy from the machine and headed into the privacy the glassed - in room.

The goth watched him gesticulating wildly, his face going all shades of red while he screamed into his phone.

"Do you understand what I'm saying, Tobias? He. Has. A. Contract. Out. On. Tony. I know you know who he is, I know your agency is using him for a mole, I – don't ask me how I know, you _know _I have contacts as deep as yours... well obviously he _has, _or he wouldn't be wandering around out there putting hits out on my agents!...Well then I'll take care of him myself, help me or don't help me, you do what you need to, but I'm gonna hunt 'im down and take him out!"

Gibbs readied to slam the phone to the floor until he realized he had more calls to make, and he couldn't get Tony to find him a new one right now. Fornell had basically given him nothing about Haswari - yes, he knew the man was in the D.C area, and no, he wouldn't have gone off the radar without his handlers knowing about it. And no, he didn't think he could find anyone who would give the Mossad agent up, the man was too valuable an asset to trade for an unknown quantity, especially a lowly NCIS agent who had no value to the intelligence community. Gibbs knew that when it came to choosing, the ones who called the shots would always pick the agent who was more mercenary than loyal and could be bought and maneuvered, even if he was a terrorist.

Worse than the information, or non-information as it were, from Fornell, was the fact that the photo that Gibbs held in his hand now was none other than Ari Haswari himself. He had had the bastard literally in his hands and had let him go, thinking he was some toadie that would run back and tattle for the man; so that look in the man's eye when he promised to kill Ari was what? Couldn't have been from his hope of climbing the Mossad ladder another rung with the man's death. But there was that unmistakable glint in the spook's eyes...what the hell was he after in the end run?

Right now Gibbs didn't have time to try to figure it out, he needed to get DiNozzo under some sort of protection without alerting the kid to it or he would balk and cause no end of problems for his boss. Which would really be all but impossible if they got called out on a case anytime soon. Damn it all, this was turning into one huge goatrope. Short of keeping Tony locked up in Autopsy with the bodies and an M.E trying to entertain him with long past, and often ribald anecdotes of college days and medical school, he'd have to either figure out how to explain what was happening to him, or try to find Haswari on his own and end him. The latter was actually looking like an easier option at the moment.

He looked away from the phone in his hand to see Abby staring at him through the glass office wall, obviously in dire need of knowing what the hell was going on and who was in trouble. Shit. He stared back at her, thinking a million different thoughts, when it hit him. She was the perfect one to tell what was going on – she could keep Tony occupied while he and Kate tracked down Ari and brought him in. To Ducky.

Pocketing the cell, he schooled his stormy features into a more settled visage and strode out to talk to her.

"Abs, need a favor from ya, but ya gotta promise to not talk till I'm done telling you about it."

"Who's in trouble, Gibbs?"

"Tony, he - "

"Well where _is _he, shouldn't he be with you if he's in trouble with someone? Or is he in trouble with you, Gibbs, cause -"

Gibbs held up his hand.

"Abs, what'd I just say?"

She pretended to zip her lips and waited patiently for his explanation. By the time he was done, she was visibly shaking, and Gibbs had no doubt she wouldn't let the young man she considered a sibling out of her sights. And Gibbs was sure that it would have all worked perfectly if he hadn't gotten that call on his cell leading them to a new murder investigation. In the end, he had no choice but to go drag DiNozzo out of his Martha Stewart haze and hope he could keep an eye on the kid while they were at the crime scene.

"Got a case, Abs, gonna have to figure something else out."

"But Gibbs, can't you just go without him, he'll be -"

"I'll take care of him, Abs." he told her over his shoulder, leaving her standing mouth open. He headed straight to the bullpen, and dialed Ducky on the way up there.

"Duck, bad news, got a case, gotta bring 'im with, send 'im back up to the bullpen."

"Oh dear, well, I suppose there's no other recourse, is there? Well, perhaps you should tell -"

"Nope. Just gonna keep 'im close as I can, he'd only get pissed and follow me anyways if I told him to stay behind; this way he's not out of our sights."

Later, on the way to the hospital, he would try to tell himself that he had done the right thing, that there was no way he could have known that the bastard Ari had set up the crime scene and then lay in wait for Tony to follow his breadcrumb trail of evidence out of Gibbs' line of vision. And there wasn't, really, any way of knowing. Crime scenes were not necessarily the safest of places anyays, where irate relatives may come to exact revenge, or a desperate suspect might disrupt the investigation with gunfire in an effort to distract long enough for evidence to disappear.

He could try to tell himself any damned thing he wanted to, but in the end, it didn't take away the gashes and bruises from Tony's body, or the blood from Gibbs' hands. When he had noticed his SFA was nowhere in sight not long after they'd arrived at the scene, his entire body froze at the same time his gut clamped up tight. Nothing that Ducky had found out about the crime victim was making any sense, and now Gibbs knew why.

"Duck, stay with the body, Kate, with me!" he barked, and her head snapped up from her sketch pad

to see him all but running towards her, his face taut with something she'd not ever seen from him.

"What is it, Gibbs?"

"Where did you last see Tony?"

"He was right over..." She looked over to where her partner had last been taking pictures to see no sign of him whatsoever. "Gibbs, you don't think -" she ventured, her face going as panicked as his.

"No, I _don't _think, I _know!" _he yelled back at her as he drew his weapon and headed off to where he felt Tony might be.

The crime scene itself was nothing but an abandoned field, littered with trash and lined in the back with a small copse of trees. There, there it was; a flattening of grass that made a trail back to an opening in the trees. Gibbs felt like he was magnetized to the opening; he was the compass point and Tony was due North. He went towards it without a word, knowing Kate would follow his lead, both of their guns trained steadily in front of them.

He had barely made it to the tree-line when he heard the cries, knew they were Tony's, and froze in his tracks. No other noises, not even bird song, just long, wretched moans trying to be heard across the field to Gibbs or Kate to signal one of them for help. Gibbs peered into the opening, eyes locking on Tony's form, then darting around every inch of the small woodlot searching for danger. Searching for Ari. There was no sign of the man, and within seconds, Gibbs' eyes were back on his SFA's form. Tony was attempting to crawl towards the edge of the trees to find the opening, and Gibbs couldn't help but close his eyes to the sight if only for a fraction of a second. Blood ran from several places on DiNozzo's face, and one eye was discolored and starting to swell all the way down to his cheekbone. It was evident he had been beaten badly; for him to not be on his feet to help himself showed how badly he was hurting.

Time had seemed to slow down, stand still when he'd laid eyes on Tony, and even though Gibbs knew only seconds had passed, it seemed like an eternity to him as the pain ripped through him at DiNozzo's hoarse groans and panicked grunted cries.

"Go get Ducky, stay with the scene, get another team here to secure it all!" he fired out behind him to Kate, blocking her line of sight to Tony.

"Gibbs, he's -he's alive, right?"

"Yes, Kate, he's alive, he needs Ducky and an ambulance, go!"


	9. Chapter 9

_**A/N: Not beta'd, and written late at night, so sorry for any mistakes; I read over it, but I'm half asleep at the moment, so who knows what I did to the thing? Probably one more chapter left for this particular story arc.**_

_He had let DiNozzo out of his sights for barely two minutes – leaning down to see what Ducky was showing him on the dead body – but in those two minutes, his SFA had disappeared into the tree line to be nearly strangled and beaten by someone. And Gibbs was more than certain who that someone was. The medical examiner had been in the process of explaining to the lead agent that there were gross inconsistencies in the manner of what appeared to be two heinous crimes. Both victims appeared to have been dead quite some time, much longer than it would have not only taken for someone to spot them lying in the open like they were, but called all manner of bugs, birds and beasts to start the ritual of turning the bodies back to the earth. Gibbs was just starting to wrap his brain around that fact when he looked up and could no longer see DiNozzo in his line of vision._

_He could see Tony all too well now, as the EMTs worked quickly and efficiently to stabilize him and get him boarded onto the waiting ambulance. Besides Gibbs, no one but Ducky had been allowed to see him; Gibbs had been adamant with Cate; in spite of what Ducky had told him about Tony's injuries most likely not being life - threatening, there was no way he was going to let her see all the blood and gashes covering her partner. He left it to the M.E to assuage her with whatever information he chose to share with her, and headed to the hospital behind the ambulance, flashing red emergency light stuck on his car roof. _

_There was blood everywhere now, on his clothes, hands and now on the steering wheel, making it slick and difficult to handle, and he had to slow down to dig out some diner napkins and wipe them down. If he hadn't been behind the wheel at the moment, he would have vomited up a week's worth of coffee. As far as he knew, Tony hadn't been stabbed or shot, but what wounds he had had bled a lot, with too many to staunch by himself until Ducky had come to help with his medical bag from the truck. He knew that head wounds bled a lot, and Tony had several, making him wonder just how much the kid could afford to lose before the EMT's arrived, but he tried to hold on to what the older man had told him – DiNozzo's pulse was still strong, and with some intravenous fluids from the EMTs and a few stitches, his SFA would live to tell them what had happened to him._

_He wasn't allowed to follow them into the emergency room, and ended up having to fill out the obligatory paperwork as Tony's next of kin anyways, so his mind was only half on all the things that could be going on behind the e.r doors. Ducky had promised to keep him abreast of anything noteworthy, and he needed a few minutes to call Fornell and explain what his agency's dicking around had cost them. It didn't matter what Fornell thought about the situation, he still wouldn't be allowed into the loop of higher ups that handled Haswari, but he knew the man would want to know. Much as the Fibbie and DiNozzo ragged on each other, they were still pretty close, and Gibbs was well aware how much anguish it was causing Fornell that his own agency was withholding life-saving information about Haswari from him. Gibbs also knew that Fornell was risking his job and reputation by following him outside the boundaries of both of their agencies in their quest to find and bring down the terrorist._

_He stabbed Fornell's speed dial number and was greeted with a surly bark from the other end of the phone. _

"_Whataya want, Gibbs, I'm in the middle of -"  
_

"_He got to him, Toby, I'm at the hospital."_

"What happened, how is he?"

"Bastard set up a double homicide crime scene, Tony followed the evidence into the woods, Ari

_grabbed him and beat the shit out of him."_

There was quiet from the other end, and for a moment Gibbs thought they'd lost the connection.

"_Tobias?"_

"Yeah, I'm here. Just – shit. Was he conscious at all, could he tell you anything?"

"He was barely conscious, and in too much pain to talk. Ducky's with him now, he's gonna keep me posted."

"Shit." Fornell cursed again. "He's gonna be okay, though, right, he's gonna live."

"Ducky said he would." Gibbs told him flatly.

"_You know it was Ari?"_

"Jesus, Tobias, who the hell else would it be, nobody but him could pull something off like this, and only he would dare to -"

"Alright, Jethro, I get it, but what the hell do you want me to do about it, if I was able to stop him I would have long ago, you know that, I'd never let Tonio get hurt -"

"_Yeah, know that, Tobias. Not expecting you to do anything, just wanted to let you know what happened."_

Fornell calmed a little, realizing his friend wasn't trying to back him into a corner.

"_Yeah. Yeah, okay. Look, you sit tight there for a while, look after him, I'll see what I can do on my end, God knows I can't piss off any more people than I already have trying to get my hands on that bastard."_

"You call me the minute you hear anything, I don't care how unreliable you think it is!"

"Yeah, I will, Jethro. We'll get 'im, I swear, one way or the other."

"Damned right we will, and he's mine when we do!"

"Jethro, don't go doing anything -"

"Don't lecture me, Toby, not while I'm standing here with Tony's blood all over my clothes and hands! I will kill him with a sharp stick if it comes down to it, but I will end him!"

Gibbs turned away at the gawping looks he was getting from nearby hospital staff.

"_Just help me get 'im, Tobias." Gibbs all but begged, lowering his voice. "He won't stop at Tony, he already said as much."_

"_Yeah, well, he knows your Achilles Heel, Jethro. Not sure how, but there's no doubt at all he knows_ it."

"_Been watchin' me, watching us! I could feel it, just couldn't put my finger on it till now."_

"Well, that's gonna come to a quick end, too. Go, Jethro, I'll get going here on my end."

"You need any help at all that you can't get at the bureau you call Abby or that McGee kid. Don't tell them what's going on with Tony, gotta do that myself or Abby'll have my head as a slide specimen."

"Got it, Jethro. Talk to ya later."

Gibbs slammed the phone shut without further ado and set off to find his other field agent, who at the moment was pacing in front of the the emergency room door waiting for her boss or anyone else to show up and tell her what was happening with her partner. When she looked up to see the murderous countenance still on his face, she was gripped with terror, expecting the worst.

"Gibbs?"_ She searched his face for any indications of the grief that would be there whether he wanted to show it or not, but found a simgle-minded fury instead._

"_This is what comes from getting sloppy, Agent Todd." he growled out between clenched teeth, and she wasn't sure if this information from him made her feel any better than the expected news that Tony had bled out or died of a seizure on the way to the hospital. She collapsed into herself, absorbing the accusation as easily as she would a compliment from the man, and feeling every bit as guilty as he intended her to. He saw it and took advantage of it, taking out his frustrations on her until Tony had come stumbling out of the e.r in a rage to smack some sense into his boss, surprising them all, until Ducky had come along and put an end to all of their drama and banished Gibbs to the waiting room, who in turn had called Fornell, only to be informed that Ari Haswari had been found._

_**END FLASHBACK**_

If the other drivers on the highways had had any idea of just how off-kilter the man behind the wheel of the blue government Dodge Charger was, they would have pulled over anywhere they could have out of terror and self-preservation. Gibbs had 'rampage' written all over his face and in his posture, and he himself realized that he needed to get his anger under control if he was to get to Fornell and then on to kill Ari. He let loose his grip on the steering wheel just a bit, and eased back into his seat, letting out a grunted breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

He knew he'd crossed the line blaming Cate for something beyond her control, and then trying to pick a fight with a brutally injured man, the very person he was trying to protect. Anger at the situation had ruled him, along with fear, which had shaken him to his core. When he'd looked up and found DiNozzo absent from the crime scene, it was if a bolt of lightning had shot through his entire body, and he'd been half expecting to find the young man dead, his throat slit through, or a bullet through his forehead.

Sheer panic had almost overwhelmed him to the point of not being able to think, until he stilled himself for a moment's time, regrouped his thoughts back to Team Leader from terrified father, and started barking orders.

He needed to do it again, to settle himself so that he could do his job, whether that turned out to be shooting Ari dead on sight, or bringing his already bullet-riddled body back to Ducky's workshop, and then go make things right with his team. Half way to the Navy Yard he realized he hadn't even asked Fornell where he was going, and slammed the man's speed dial number down while he veered around a bicyclist and nearly drove the car coming the opposite way off the road. For the first time in ages he had attached the flashing red light to the top of the Charger, not wanting to risk having to take the time to explain who he was and where he was going to a LEO patrolling the highways. He yelled into the phone's speaker, not wanting to take his hands off the wheel long enough talk into it.

"Jethro, what the hell? Where are you?"

"On my way to the Navy Yard, where are you?"

"On my way to the Hoover Building, we've got Ari in custody, tells us he wants to 'get out of the family business' and wants the FBI to help him in exchange for information on certain terrorist cells."

Gibbs nearly drove off the road at Fornell's statement, and ignored the blaring horn of the car behind him.

"Tell me you're not gonna help him, Tobias, cause I swear to God if your director okays that, there won't be a place in hell you can stash Haswari where I won't find him and beat the shit outta him!"

Gibbs raged into the phone, so loudly that Fornell had to hold his own away from his ear.

"Not even the director's call, Jethro, but who knows if the guy is even serious, you know what a head case he is, he could be playing us with no intention of turning over a new leaf. I can't see him having it in him, he likes the thrill of the game too much."

"I do not _care _what his intentions are, Tobias, he assaulted a federal officer, he's going to Git Mo on the toe of my boot! I'm calling the SecNav myself, and don't you think he won't see things my way, he likes DiNozzo, and he owes me favors!"

"Jesus, Jethro, enough with the screaming at me! I'm just the god damned messenger, I got nothing to do with what actually happens to the douche bag! Meet me here and we'll let the directors duke it out, I'll go get coffee while I'm waiting for you."

"I'll be there in five, you hold them off for a while."

Gibbs hung up, leaving Fornell shaking his head in wonderment at the man. The Gunny actually believed this Fibbie had some sort of pull in the agency? Things would go the way they would go, what Gibbs and he wanted to happen was of no consequence to the powers that be. He pulled into the parking garage of the Hoover Building just behind the police escort car that housed Haswari, and was surprised to look up and find Director Tom Morrow's limo pull up behind them all. Well, things were going to get interesting, and once Gibbs got there, they were going to get positively scary.


	10. Chapter 10

_**A/N: I know I've said it before, but I LOVE former Director Morrow and have no earthly clue why the powers that be didn't find him suitable enough to keep around. He was smart, tough, knew what was going on in his own backyard and probably every one else's, was willing to bend the rules a bit when necessary, didn't take crap from anyone , didn't kiss the politicians or Navy's ass, and most importantly, his only agenda seemed to be to look out for his agency and employees. Short-ish chapter, next and last one is of Tony back on his plaid couch being force-fed and ganged-up on by Gibbs and company.**_

Shortly after NCIS Director Tom Morrow's limo pulled in behind them, they all could hear tires screeching on concrete as a vehicle approached at high speed. Several of them wondered if it would be prudent to take cover somewhere – could be someone coming to rescue Ari Haswari out of custody to whisk him out of the country. Fornell was pretty sure of who it was and stood his ground, waiting for the blue company Dodge to show up with a boiling Gibbs behind the wheel. If the other agents had known who it was, they for sure would have run for cover. It was a known fact among the alphabet agencies that NCIS Senior Field Agent Anthony DiNozzo was his boss's kin in every way but blood, and when the young man was injured in the line of duty, everyone who knew enough either helped or got the hell out of the man's way.

Fornell saw a smile forming on Tom Morrow's face as the speeding car rounded the corner to meet up with them, and barely come to a stop before the occupant jumped out. The FBI agent steeled himself for the impending blow-up, and thought he could feel the rage radiating off the former Marine as he strode over to them, face set in a murderous glare. Morrow seem ready for him, though, and met up with him with a firm hand to squeeze his shoulder, and all but gave him a wink and a nod, which seemed to calm the man considerably. Fornell couldn't read the cryptic look, but it must have conveyed something along the lines that he had things under control. _His_ control. Fornell's gut roiled even further at the thought of the all-out turf war that was about to ensue.

"Gentlemen." Morrow's strong, steady voice echoed around the parking area. "There will be no jurisdictional fist fights in this parking garage. Any physical altercations will take place in the confines of one of the Bureau's conference rooms. Nothing in public, please."

And with that he moved them on across the expanse of the garage towards the elevators, ignoring Gibbs' furtive looks behind him to see where their prisoner was.

"How is Tony doing, Jethro?"

"He's in a world of hurt, got god damned _boot _prints on his ribs, so don't even _think _of telling me you're gonna hand him over to Fornell's crew."

"Gotta make it look like we're cooperating, Jethro." Morrow answered him smoothly. "He'll be in their custody until the SecNav can talk to the Bureau chief, they're both on conference calls on a delicate security issue. So just keep your shirt on for a while and pretend to play nice."

"Tobias says they want him for an informant, and that Haswari is asking for asylum here."

"Oh, he'll get to stay around, and if they want him as an informant, good luck to them getting any viable intel. They'll have to visit him in Git Mo to retrieve it, though. Doesn't matter, he'll just make it up as he goes along, tell them what they want to hear. If they're not smart enough to realize that, they deserve to waste their time and resources on him."  
Morrow stopped at the elevator doors to wait for the rest of the crew to catch up with them. He really didn't want Gibbs within a hundred feet of Ari, but he was the person in charge at the moment, and needed to keep track of where their prisoner was and what he was doing at all times. He wasn't sure who to watch more closely, though, his top MCRT agent with a grudge from there to Calcutta against the the 'alleged terrorist', or the terrorist himself. Something didn't sit right with him, just as it wasn't sitting well with Gibbs, and he hauled in a deep breath as Fornell and his agents and their prisoner caught up with them. He barely had time to let it out when he heard the screeching of tires, then loud banging noises – his first thought was that the out of control car had popped a tire on the turn, but it was difficult to make out what was really happening in the few seconds of din and confusion.

He had no problem figuring it out when he looked over at Fornell, who was standing with a stunned look on his bloodied face, his eyes wide with momentary shock. _My God, not Fornell, _he yelled in his head, his teeth grinding together. The man was Jethro's only friend save for Ducky Mallard, and with the young man whom everyone considered as close as a son to Gibbs beaten within an inch of his life earlier that day – Gibbs wouldn't withstand that sort of emotional punishment.

'Jethro, call 911, I'll get Haswari under cover."

"No." his agent answered back flatly, and Morrow's head snapped over to him, his turn for standing with a shocked look. _'No?' _Morrow fairly screamed in his head. What the hell was the _matter _with the man, his friend had just been a victim of a drive-by shooting! Then he had a moment of clear thought, and looked back at the scene before him. There on the concrete, Ari Haswari lie dead, eyes open in permanent dismay as blood pooled behind his head. No one moved for a few moments, until Morrow got his voice back and grabbed his phone out of his coat pocket.

"This is Director Morrow, Code Red, I need the parking garage on lock down, immediately, no one in or out of here, by car or foot." He waited to make sure his orders were being followed, listening for alarms and doors slamming shut at the entrances and exits, then went ahead with more. "I need security on parking level 4, bring a SWAT team, we've got shooters in the garage." He hung up and looked at Gibbs, who's face seemed expressionless, but Morrow could read the smug satisfaction beneath the Marine on high alert. If he hadn't known Gibbs had wanted to kill Haswari with his own bare hands, he might have contemplated the thought that the Gunny had put a hit out on the man himself.

"Call Ducky, tell him to be ready with the autopsy van so he can bring the body back to the Yard. Fibbies won't want him now that he can't talk."

Gibbs nodded, then looked over to Fornell.

"That alright with _you, _Tobias?" he asked, as if extending a courtesy to the FBI through his friend, but in essence, trying to stir the man back into reality. "Doubt he's got anything more to say."

"Uh – yeah, sure, Jethro." Fornell finally blurted, searching for his handkerchief and wiping away some of Ari's blood. "Shit, whoda thunk? Nobody was supposed to even know he was in our custody, he was by himself when we picked him up."

"Never by himself, Tobias. They probably got everything he owns bugged somehow. What the hell does it matter, not our problem anymore."  
Fornell nodded dumbly, and stepped away from the body, not wanting his blood on his shoes, too.

"What a helluva day. We get this tied up, I'm going to tie one on at O'Shays. Come pick me up around two."

Gibbs smiled, knowing the man was only half -joking, and squeezed his upper arm.

"Any other time I would, Tobias, but I have a feeling I'm gonna be spending the night trying to tie a _rope _around Tony trying to keep him from going AWOL from the hospital."

"Yeah. I'll call a cab. She-zus, I could use a drink right now. Heard the damned slug whistle right past my head."

Gibbs grew serious, and realized his friend did indeed need some extra attention. His ghostly pallor spoke of shock setting in, and Gibbs clasped his arm and towed him towards the elevator.

"You guys got this under control?" he queried, looking at Morrow and the other FBI agents.

The elevator door opened just then, ejecting several well-armed agents wearing tactical gear and grim faces.

"Take him upstairs, Jethro, I'll give you a call later." Morrow assured him.

"Come on, Tobias. Let's go raid that bottom drawer in your desk."


	11. Chapter 11

_**A/N Read it or not, or skip to the story. For something as innocuous as fanfiction, it's really an incredibly difficult thing to do. First you have to decide who you are writing for, and then constantly find that balance. Then, for those of us who are able and willing to do it, write something not filled with grammatical, spelling and gaping plot errors. All the while attempting to not offend anyone, no matter how unintentionally. I once got livid with the NCIS show writers and wrote a crackfic about TIVA that never in all this time has garnered so much kerfuffle. Every story, every chapter, every paragraph of every fic opens up a writer on this site to any sort of abuse and criticism, and the writing is of course done on the writer's own time, energy, and good will, and for free. I have never in any of my stories deleted unkind, or even nasty, reviews. Writing is art and open to everyone's interpretation and opinion. I won't delete what has been written for either my Great Expectations fic or my counter-crack fic. If I have disappointed some and lost readership from those who thought I was above defending myself, well, none of us are perfect, but even so, I won't apologize for it. It's far easier to stand at the sidelines while someone is getting thumped for something they didn't even do, and then wag a finger at them for defending themselves. I am open to con crit for poor spelling and grammar (anyone notice that Gibbs doesn't say 'yer' anymore?) forgotten plot lines, long waits between updates, and any of the endless nitpicking that sometimes ensues, but I draw the line at outright idiocy and nastiness. I don't take it in real life, I won't 'take it' in fiction. I resorted to a crack fic instead of pm'g or blocking the flamers, and the ones who reviewed anon., well, they're nearly ALWAYS anonymous reviews. Go figure. So far all of the reviews wagging their finger at me for having my fun are also 'Guest' reviews. Hmmm.**_

_**As far as writers being instructed to only write about characters they 'like', well how ridiculous and arrogant is that, for crying out loud? How does that make for balanced writing? Then when we actually DO, we get accused of being unfair and hating the rest of the team. Frankly Idislike nearly ALL of the NCIS characters the way they are written by the show writers, so I'd be hard put to write anything. Do readers actually want their characters flawless, with no realism and development? They are all human, all struggling, all making mistakes that affect their lives and work environment. Unfortunately the show itself has taken these character flaws and blown them out of proportion, turned them into caricatures, letting them behave and do things that would really never be tolerated on the actual job, all for the sake of drama and ratings. That's why I write fan fic, and from now on, will stick to writing AU like I should have in the first place. I wasn't making a point to the flamers, I can't even imagine they would ever look at another one of my fics again. I did it for fun. Cause it made me laugh and feel better. **_

_**VH, sorry this took so long, I was watching 'Psyche'. I voted for Martin, the INSUFFERABLE AUTHOR from Haaa-vard. I'm waiting for the 'secret chocolate room'.**_

Neither NCIS nor the FBI agents were able to locate the person or persons who had shot and killed Ari Haswari. None of them were too broken up over the fact, but for the Fibbies it was a personal insult that someone had come onto their turf, shot and killed a suspect while in their custody, and then disappeared seemingly into thin air. There must have been at least two people, no one would have been able to shoot that accurately from a vehicle moving at that speed. Thinking back on it, most of them remembered the car slowing down just as it approached them, but had forgotten it as soon as the bullets started to fly.

A car fitting that description had not been found anywhere in the parking garage, nor had anyone passed security on foot soon after the shooting. It obviously had been well planned by the assassins, and the search was on for what person or organization would want Haswari dead. Gibbs had barked out a good laugh when Fornell's junior agent Sacks had announced they were going to start gathering a list of possible suspects, and expected Gibbs and his team to do their duty by adding to it, earning a disgusted look from the young man.

"You knock your socks off, there, Sacks." he slapped the agent's back, kindly ignoring the insolent look that would have earned DiNozzo a good swift smack. "You find 'em, just tell them I owe them one."

With that he left the still locked down building, following behind Tom Morrow's limousine and flashing his I.D so fast the guard barely had a chance to get a good look at it. Most of them already new Gibbs, though, for better or worse, and he headed straight for the hospital as soon as he was into traffic. He had called Ducky earlier to tell him what was happening and not to let Tony out of his sight, and Ducky had informed him that 'the lad' had been given a good dose of painkiller and was at the moment, in the land of Nod. That had been over two hours ago, and there was no telling what sort of mayhem was going on with DiNozzo now, as he never slept long even when drugged up.

Sure enough, when he reached the IC unit currently occupied by his SFA, he could hear a definite ruckus going on inside, and was nearly bowled over by a nurse hurrying out of the room with a very indignant look on her face. Inside he could hear Ducky's normally dulcet tone being taken over by a hard, impatient edge, and knew he needed to rescue either Tony or the M.E.

Striding in, he did a quick sit rep, and found his SFA half-way in and half-way out of his bed, with Ducky battling to pull the side rails up before he could escape completely.

"Back in the bed, DiNozzo, _now!" _bellowed, not caring how he sounded to the nursing staff. He guaranteed they'd thank him for it later. Even in his post durgged - sleep state, the voice made Tony jump in his skin and clamber back onto the bed.

"Ah, Jethro, thank goodness. We are in a bit of a state, here, I'm afraid, I was trying to convince him that all was well with you but he wouldn't believe me and was going to go find you. Stubborn boy, trying to pull out his stitches and fall on his head all at the same time. Do talk some sense into the lad, before I have to sedate him again."

Gibbs saw the look that passed over his second's face and stepped up to his bedside.

"Tony, calm down now." He spoke in a voice that was quiet for him, but still held an order. "Everything's been taken care of, nobody else got hurt."

Tony seemed to only half hear him, still too far out of it to listen to understand reason, and Gibbs could see the mulish look in his eye. Normally he would just yell out a Marine-style "Hey!" and DiNozzo would be at attention, but there'd been too much damage done to the kid already and Gibbs just didn't have the heart to scare him again by screaming at him. Instead he grabbed Tony's chin and gently held it.

"Hey." he said at only a tenth his usual volume, which really got Tony's attention. "Ari's dead, he can't hurt anyone anymore. Lie back down and rest, I'll sit here with you. Maybe Ducky will find me some coffee from the doctor's lounge."

Tony blinked a few times, absorbing what his boss had just told him.

"Who – who killed him? Boss, you – are you in trouble, are you – gonna get fired?"

Gibbs knew that under normal circumstances, Tony would know better than to ask that question, but nothing had been anywhere near normal for either of them the past couple of days.

"Didn't kill 'im, DiNozzo, never got the chance. Fornell and his boys were bringing him into the Hoover Building for questioning when somebody drove by and put one in between his eyes. He was dead before he hit the concrete."

"Catch them?"

"Nope. No idea yet who it was or where they are. Got clean away, but I don't imagine Fornell will let it go."

"He -he's not in trouble, is he, Boss?"

"Nah, I don't think so. Gone off to O'Shay's to tie one on. He'll probably just have a few and take a cab home."

Tony sighed and leaned back into the pillows, and Gibbs could feel the tension leeching out of his second as they talked.

"Let Ducky check you over, make sure you didn't bust anything, I'm going to go sit down in the corner here and just close my eyes for a bit."

Tony grinned woozily at the man, and shook his finger at him

"Yer gonna take a nap, aren'tcha, Boss? That's okay, 'm gonna take one, too. I can sleep now, now that I know yer not – dead or something."

"Nope, not dead or something, Tony. Just tired." he assured, patting Tony's cheek and smiling down at him. "You need anything, just holler."

"When can I go home, Boss?" DiNozzo searched his face with pleading eyes. "I hate it here. The nurses are mean to me. Well, not all 'a them, just Nurse Joanne just now."

"I'll find out, Tony. Close your eyes, think of Panama City Beach. Maybe when you're back in the saddle you can take some time to go down there for a few days. Been a while, hasn't it?"  
"Few years, Boss. Gonna go to sleep now, wake me up when the pizza gets here."

"Didn't order a pizza, DiNozzo. They wouldn't let you eat it if I did."

"So says Nurse Joanne."

"Don't worry about it, DiNozzo, a day or two and you can come home, park on the couch and -"

Gibbs turned to look at his second, to make sure he was understanding what he was saying, only to find the young man fast asleep, snoring softly through slightly parted lips. Two minutes later, the Gunny was parked in the bedside chair, snoring right along with him.

_TWO DAYS LATER_

"Boss, I don't need more water, you're drowning me here." Tony protested as Gibbs stood before him with yet another bottle of spring water.

"Ducky says you have to have lots of fluids with those antibiotics, drink."

Tony took the bottle, unscrewed the cap, and took a small swallow, able to say he had drank and hydrated himself.

"Right, and then I have to go pee a dozen times and get up the cellar stairs."

"Tried to get you to sleep in the guest bedroom."

"You know I sleep better down here. It's cooler and not as stuffy."

"Got an air conditioner that works, DiNozzo."

"Too noisy. I like it here, Boss, just – I like it here."

Gibbs dropped the subject, realizing that not only was it pointless to argue with a determined Tony about it, it didn't really matter all that much where the kid was, as long as he was safe and comfortable.

"Okay. Want anything to eat? Haven't had much of that pizza."

"Antibiotics mess with my stomach, Boss. Not up to a lot yet."

Gibbs nodded, and sat down on the couch next to Tony.

"Tried to figure out a way to tell you about Ari, just didn't have the time until it was too late. Maybe if I had, you -"

"Boss, do _not _even go there, I was following an evidence trail, do you really think I would have just stayed behind, or stayed standing in place while you and Cate worked the crime scene? I mean, who _knew,_ no one would have expected such a thing -"

"I _should _have!"

"You know what, Boss? You're a great agent, a great team leader, and even better man. I've learned a lot from you and I'm still learning. You've – you've done more for me in two years than my father has done in my entire life. There's no one that I respect, or trust, more than you. No one. But I've got news for ya, Boss. Even though I get a little carried away and treat you like it, you're not freaking God. You _don't _know everything, you can't _be _everything. You just do your best, every day, like I do. Sometimes it's not enough to keep someone from getting hurt, or killed. Doesn't mean you get to give up, or go some destructive guilt trip. So do what so many people have told me over the years and get over yourself."

"He -could-have-killed-you! Right in under my god damned nose."

"Unh hunh. And a suspect could shoot me while resisting arrest. Or run me down with their car. Or any one of a dozen other scenarios that happen to LEO's and feds when they're doing their jobs. So get over yourself. You can't protect me every minute of the day, anymore than I can do it for you. We can have each other's six as best we can, but we can't bend and manipulate life and people to behave the way we want them to. It took all of ten seconds for Ari to have me in a choke hold, and another two or three to beat the cornflakes out of me. It was done and over before you even knew I was missing."

"I tried keepin' you away from him 'til I could blow his brains out, just didn't work."

"Ducky's Italian gigolo furniture mover?"

"What?"

"Ducky's mom called me that when I came to stay with her when Ducky was -"

"I remember."

"Did a nice job on his office. Lots more room in it now. Can we not talk about Ari anymore and just make him another boogey man for my closet of bad memories?"

Gibbs nodded wordlessly and uncapped a beer, swallowing half of the bottle in one go as if he was dying of thirst.

"I apolgized to Cate for yelling at her at the hospital. Almost had to pick up off the floor."

"That was unwarranted, Gibbs, you deserved to have to break your own rule on that one."

"I know."

"No way could she have taken him out in that crowd and you know it."

"Yuhp. I do. And you know that I was a little out of my head at having your blood all over me and his boot prints on your ribs."

"Better than a bullet between the eyes, Gibbs, which you know he was totally capable of making happen."

Gibbs gulped another slug of beer and reached over to Tony to pat his still stitched face.

"I know. Easy to say now, harder to do at the time."

"Kinda fond of me now, are ya, Boss? Don't like seeing my blood outside my body? You can admit it, I won't tell Cate I'm your favorite."

"Like hell you won't. You'll torture her about it for the next two years."

"That means I am, right? That you love me?"

"Love is such a strong word, DiNozzo. Fond works better."

"It would for anyone but you, Boss, but you never do anything half assed, you either really, really dislike someone, or you love them with everything you've got."

"Think it's time for some of those sedatives, Anthony, you're getting a little over-wrought."

Tony graced the man with a goofy smile, and swatted his arm.

"Already took them, Ducky slipped them in my tea when he didn't think I was looking. Couldn't call him on it and embarrass him. Doesn't matter, I was really tired anyways, and my stitches hurt like hell."

Gibbs stood up and took the water bottle from his young friend and set it aside, then helped Tony get situated on the old sofa with blankets and pillows.

"You stay with me for a while, Boss?" Tony asked as Gibbs arranged the covers around him.

"I'll sit with you till you go to sleep, then I'm gonna stay down here and work on my boat, how's that sound?"

"Sounds good, Boss. Like hearin' you puttering and sanding and stuff."

"Good. Go to sleep, kid. See you in the morning."

"'Night, Boss. Happy boating building."

Gibbs smiled and waited for sleep to really overtake his battered SFA before turning to pour himself a couple of fingers of Jack and spending the next six hours quietly working and watching Tony sleep, peacefully now that he was on his beloved basement couch. Now they both would begin to heal.

_**TBC – short epilogue to follow. With no long-winded author's note.**_


	12. Chapter 12

Gibbs had kept an ear on Tony while he worked and cleaned his basement, careful not to make any loud noises that would disturb the younger man's sleep, but making enough background noise to let Tony's subconscious know that Gibbs was still there and watching his six. Somehow the kid knew the difference, and had complained once to his befuddled boss that the man had been too quiet. It was unsettling to know that his second didn't sleep well in total silence, but he'd never asked why it was the case, as Tony had never offered a clue when they'd first talked about it.

Now it was time for the farm report, and Gibbs turned the television on at a low decibel as he swept up sawdust and beer bottle caps. He'd snoozed a bit earlier, grabbing a couple hours at the end of the couch. Gibbs had gently lifted up Tony's feet, slipped in under them, and slept with them on his lap. He knew he risked a kick in the family jewels sitting like that, but he needed the contact with the young man who'd become as close as blood relation to him, to know that Tony was still alive, still breathing, still in one piece.

He'd started a pot of coffee brewing, courtesy of the fancy rig DiNozzo had bought him for Christmas last year and insisted he put in the basement, as that seemed to be where both of them spent the most time when they were there. He was trying to think of what he had available for breakfast for the both of them when he heard stirring from the couch, and looked over to see a sight that made him both cringe and chuckle at the same time. Tony blinked blearily over at him, still looking half asleep and his hair sticking out in every direction from the way he'd slept on the sofa. The bruising on his face was going black and yellow, and the skin around his stitches looked angry and painful.

"Smell coffee." was all he offered, barely opening his mouth.

"Good. Means you still got your blood hound nose."

Tony heaved a sigh and swung his bare feet to the floor, smiling when they hit the shearling carpet Abby had bought him to lay between the couch and coffee table. Gibbs had fussed at the luxury of such a thing in his basement, but had to admit to himself that if felt damned nice even under sock feet instead of the chilly concrete beneath it.

"Gotta pee. Want anything from upstairs?"

"Nope. All set. Take it slow, don't want ya falling on your head first thing in the morning."

"Not a problem, Boss. Feel like I got hit by a Mack truck."

"Yuhp. You will for a while, but you already know that. Use the handrail, don't try being a prima donna."

Tony gave a half grin, mostly to himself, at Gibbs' words.

"Couldn't even sous sous if I tried, Boss." DiNozzo mumbled back, knowing the man wouldn't have the first clue as to what he meant, other than it was probably French. It would be a cold day in hell before Tony ever admitted to an -ee– one that he had been forced to endure a year of ballet classes as a child, thanks to his mother's misguided efforts to help the gangly boy acquire some balance instead of tripping over his feet. Worst part of it was, it _had _helped Tony gain a better center of gravity, but even Tony the child knew there were other ways to achieve the same thing without subjecting him to such embarrassing torture. Later on he did admit to himself that it had actually helped him quite a bit during his college sports years, but still, it wasn't anything he pretended to know the slightest thing about when he was in mixed company.

Half way up the stairs, he heard a rattling of the front door and froze mid-step, unconsciously turning to Gibbs to see if he had heard it too.

"Stay there, I'll go check it out." he ordered, grabbing up his extra Sig and heading up the stairs past Tony, who didn't move until he heard Gibbs' annoyed voice chastising someone.

"Jesus Christ, Tobias, it's six o'clock in the damned morning! I might've blown your fool head off if you hadn't made so much noise!"

"_Sorry, _I couldn't sleep! Figured you'd be up and have the coffee pot on, which you do. I brought breakfast." he declared, holding up two large white bags. "Grease _and _goo. Got the kid's favorite, is he up to eating anything yet?"

"Well why don'tcha ask him yourself, Tobias, he was on his way up here to use the head when we heard you crashing through the front door."

Tony appeared around the corner of the small dining room, moving slowly but surely now that he knew that Fornell wasn't some terrorist come to off him for causing so much trouble amid the ranks. Honestly, he still wasn't sure why he'd been targeted, he had not really been lucid enough since his beating at the hands of Ari to have any lengthy conversation with his boss, or anyone else, for that matter.

"Dinutso!" Fornell yelled out cheerily, half baiting the younger man and half happy to see the agent alive. Besides not wanting to have to live with the aftermath of Gibbs' life if Tony had not survived the attack by Ari, the Fibbie was rather fond of DiNozzo, though he only ever admitted to Gibbs, who knew without being told. It was easy to like the kid, especially away from the job where Tony got jazzed on adrenaline and often turned annoying in his need to release the pent up energy. Outside of work, at Gibbs' place and social functions, DiNozzo was more laid back, less nervous and wired. He didn't talk as much, and didn't feel the need to be 'on' all the time.

"Gibbs says you're starving to death, brought you some breakfast."

Still only half-alert even with his recent fright, Tony gave Fornell a wan smile and kept heading towards the downstairs half bathroom.

"Just woke up, Tobias." Gibbs explained at Fornell's questioning look. "Let him finish, then we'll head back downstairs. Go grab a coffee mug, we'll meet you down there."

Tobias headed off with his laden down bags and found his favorite coffee mug amidst the odd assortment of cups and glasses in Gibbs' cupboard, then made his way to the basement. He had the breakfast assortment out and waiting on the bench and was pouring himself a steaming cup of the elixir from the just brewed pot when Tony appeared on the stairs, followed by a watchful Gibbs. Both of them looked out of sorts, and Fornell could only wonder what had happened.

"Boss thinks I need a babysitter." Tony grumbled, reading the FBI agent's questioning look.

"I _do not _think you need a babysitter, DiNozzo, I'm just making sure you don't lose your balance and fall on your head, you're still a little wobbly on your feet."

"I'm okay if I take my time, Boss. Just gotta get my equilibrium back."

"Yeah, well, until you do, I'm covering your six."

Tony harrumphed and settled back down onto the couch, grabbing his favorite blanket and wrapping it up around him. The effort of going up the stairs and back down again had made him out of breath and a little over-warm. Now that he had stopped moving, he was cool and uncomfortable. No way would he admit any of it to Gibbs. Still, he could admit at least to himself that he did like being watched over.

"Mangia, mangia, Tonio!" Fornell crowed, rattling forks and plates and raided from Gibbs' cupboards. "You can't have had anything decent to eat in that hospital!"

"I brought him plenty, Tobias." Gibbs announced in an offended tone. "Even some contraband. He's on a strong antibiotic, sort of ruins his appetite."

"Not so much that I can't manage part of a breakfast sandwich, thank you very much."

He helped himself to one, pulling it in half and saving the rest for later, hoping to have enough room for one of the apple fritters sitting out before him.

"Thanks, Tobias." Tony offered genuinely. "It's good. Cate's been shoving yogurt down my throat every chance she gets, had about as much of that as I can stand for a while."

Fornell looked over at Gibbs and they exchanged knowing smirks, both acknowledging that 'big sister' was determined to have Tony's six, too.

"And Abby should be charging down here any time with Bert and bringing all my books, CDs, DVDs, my computer, my iPad, and anything else she thinks I'm lacking to keep me out of trouble."

"And you wouldn't have it any other way, wouldya , DiNozzo?"Gibbs chided.

"Nope. Wouldn't change a thing." Tony grinned, eating the last of the half of his breakfast burritto.

"Got some intel on Ari's killer, one of those times when truth is stranger than fiction." Fornell offered out of the blue. "We think it's his half-sister Ziva David, his Mossad handler. Guess he was getting too out of control for even them, but to have his own sister do it? Pretty damned cold."

Tony grimaced. He had seen plenty of what family members could do to each other in his years as a cop, and his time at NCIS, so really, this wasn't as shocking to him as it may have sounded to someone else, especially considering the core of people that were involved in what they were talking about – spies, assassins, double-agents and out-right turn coats. He wiped his fingers on a napkin and set about polishing off the apple fritter in front of him.

"Well then I owe Ziva David a favor, Tobias. Saved me from having to turn in more paperwork."

"I'll tell her if I ever happen to meet her, which hopefully in this case, I never will."  
"Never say never, Toby. Rule number 27. Right, Boss?"

Gibbs smirked at his young charge, knowing full well he didn't have a Rule 27. Until now.

_**A/N – This is the end to this story arc, for now, but I may pick the thread back up at a later date with the right plot bunny. Next up is a chapter involving the uber Marine Damon Werth from "Corporal Punishment".**_


	13. Chapter 13

_**A/N: Contrary to what my crack fics say, I honestly do love my NCIS gang. Just not the way they're being written for the past few seasons, and they're so fun to pick on in their present states.**_

_** As per this entire series, this story is AU, and OOC for Gibbs, who actually manges to be a decent human being to Tony. Cate doesn't get deaded, and Morrow is still Director. My fantasy NCIS. This chapter is based very loosely on the ep. 'Corporal Punishment'.**_

For the first time in as long as Director Tom Morrow could remember, MCRT Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo was quiet, and while on most occasions he might think that was a good thing as far as the overly-talkative young man was concerned, this was not one of those times. He could certainly understand the reason behind it, though, and could not say he blamed him.

Tony had been left in Morrow's care until his team's return from finding out what had been behind Corporal Damon Werth's meltdown when Gibbs' MCRT had gone to arrest him for assault. The team lead believed there was more to the situation than just a Marine-gone-bad-on-drugs, and was determined to get to the bottom of it. Unfortunately, DiNozzo had gotten the worst of the Corporal's super human ability to maim, and ended up with a fractured nose and major concussion as a result.

Gibbs had rushed Tony to the emergency room, where they had been met by Ducky, and then proceeded to pass him off to the care of the M.E, who watched the Gunny storm out of the place after politely lecturing him that he really should stay with his injured agent and let Caitlyn and perhaps a member from another team, such as Agent Balboa, sort out the rampaging Corporal. Gibbs would have plenty of time to exact his own justice on the sorry excuse for a Marine when he was done getting Tony squared away.

But Ducky had been loudly informed that the lead agent had no intention of exacting revenge on the Corporal, that in fact he was going to find out just who had drugged the young soldier, and why. His gut was telling him this was not a case of illegal drug use gone wrong, or any other deviant behavior on the part of Werth, but that Werth was a victim of something dark and sinister and beyond his own doing. Ducky huffed impatiently, not prone to making snap judgements even when Gibbs' gut was in full swing, but he knew a determined Gibbs when he saw one, and how pointless it would be to try to deter the man.

So it was under those circumstances that the M.E had seen to Tony's treatment and brought him back to the Navy Yard, not willing to leave the young man to his own devices at home no matter how much he protested that he would be just fine and could take care of himself. Ducky had planned on bringing Tony with him to autopsy to keep an eye on him there, but had arrived to find two bodies from a military training exercise gone wrong waiting for immediate examination. There was no way he could concentrate on the urgent post mortems and keep track of a wayward, drug-addled DiNozzo, so a helpful Director Morrow had offered to oversee Tony's care until Agents Gibbs and Todd arrived back to the bull pen.

Now Tony sat staring sullenly ahead into space, breathing through his mouth from the nasal congestion and barely making out anything that was more than a foot in front of him due to the swelling around his eyes. His nose had been set and bandaged, and he had been given a strong analgesic that had gone straight to his brain and let loose a side of him he hated for anyone to see, and yet there he was in full- blown loopsey in front of the Big Boss. The best he could hope for was to not say anything, which was more difficult than usual as he had plenty to spew about being left behind by his team like a child with a sitter while Gibbs went off to make sure nothing untoward happened to the poor, unfortunate Corporal Werth.

Corporal Werth who had gone after Tony's boss like a bull elephant and would have knocked Gibbs into Cate with a force that could have ended two careers, and perhaps worse, in one blow.

Anthony DiNozzo was so not a fan of the hopped -up Marine at the moment, and he really wanted to let everyone know. Not only that, his head re-a-lly hurt, and his nose felt like it was ten times its actual size and throbbing like a huge neon sign. And not only that, but even _Ducky _had abandoned him in his time of need. How wrong was _that?_

"Did you say something, Agent DiNozzo?" Morrow asked casually.

"Huh?" _Crap, he'd said it out loud, even though he was sure he had just been thinking it. "_Ughh. No.

I-" he sighed defeatedly. "I'm not sure, Directory. Er, Director. If I did, it wasn't – I didn't – nevermind."

Morrow smiled at the young man across his desk put his pen down.

"I hear that you jumped in front of your boss before Werth could land on him."

"Who – no, I – who told you I did that? Cause that – no one can know that."

"Oh?" the Director's eyebrows rose in surprise and concern. "Why is that, Agent DiNozzo?"

"Cause – it will make him look bad. Like – like -"

"Like he's not tough enough to defend himself?"

"Not true, he just doesn't _need _to, that's what _I'm _there for."

Morrow's eyes narrowed in disapproval.

"That what he teaches you, DiNozzo? That you're there to be his fall guy?"

"Hell _no, _Director! I -I mean – no. He's never taught me that. I just – well, he's th' boss, and I'm his second. That's my job. Ya know, like the tackles taking the hits to protect the quarterback."

"I think you've been taking too many hits lately, Anthony." Morrow told him gently, "Maybe it's time you delegated some of the responsibility."

"Only the Boss gets to call me Anthony. Director. Sir. And if I hadn't taken the shot, Gibbs would've landed on top of Catie and that was a play I wasn't gonna let happen. She's tough, but he would've hurt her landing on her as hard as he would have if Werth had slammed into him. As it was we all landed on our asses. Umm, I mean -our – on our -"

"Posteriors?" Morrow offered with an amused grin at Tony's attempt to not offend his boss's boss.

"Yeah, them. Did Ducky say when Gibbs and Cate were gonna be back? Cause I'm sure you've got more important things to do than sit here yakking with me."

"Not at the moment, actually. Just catching up on some personal correspondence."

"Oh." Tony sagged a bit, at a loss for what else to say to the man. He had a lot to say, all of it going around and around in his head, but stopping when it got to his lips and going back around again. This was so totally unfair to leave him in this condition with the Big Boss, when he was angry and in pain and just wanting to curl up on his couch in Gibbs' basement and be left alone to think about the man running off to help some muscle-bound meth head who had tried to kill them all instead of staying and

talking him through his latest diarrhea of the mouth episode. "You must know a lot of people. Have lots of pen pals."

"I – wouldn't exactly call them 'pen pals, but yes, I correspond with them."

"You think Gibbs and Cate are on their way back yet?"

Morrow smiled patiently at his impatient guest.

"Why don't I call and see, Tony?"

DiNozzo smiled a loopy grin and settled back into the cushiony sofa while Morrow used his own cell phone to call his top MCRT agent.

"Yeah, Gibbs!" came a harried voice across the waves, then a pause, and a mumbled 'Oh shit.' Morrow merely smiled, knowing full well Gibbs rarely looked at the number before answering out in the field.

"Hey, Tom, everything okay?"

"I have an agent here who wants to know if you and Cate are on their way back."

"He making a fuss, Tom?"

"Nope, just asking, I think he's getting really tired."

"I'll send Cate after him, tell him to – ah hell, let me talk to him."

Morrow handed over his phone to a surprised Tony.

"DiNozzo, don't give the Director a hard time."

"I wasn't, Boss, honest."

"I'm sending Cate to get you, she'll take you to my place and wait for me till I get home, got it?"

"Got it, Boss. Thanks."

"No booze, no solids; milkshakes and soup only. You know the drill."

"Yes, Boss."

"Tell me what I just told you."  
Tony sighed as quietly as he could and lowered his voice into the phone.

"Caitie's coming to get me to take me to your place and don't drink and don't eat solid food."

"Good boy. Behave yourself, don't talk the Director's ear off. Play those games on your phone for a while."

"Okay. Bye." he answered quietly, handing the phone back to Morrow with a bit of a flush in his cheeks. "He told me to...nevermind. Can I get a drink of water?"

"Sure, Tony. Sit tight, I've got some bottles in the mini fridge here."

Tony nodded and slid down into the couch, retrieving his cell and powering it up for a few rounds of Tetris while he waited for his partner. Morrow handed him the bottle of spring water, and he thanked the man, then huffed in exasperation as he threw the phone down.

"Gibbs told me to play games on my phone while I waited but I can't do that when I see two screens in front of me, and my fingers won't work cause they're doing stupid things. Hope I don't need to use my weapon in the next few minutes cause I'd shoot somebody's eye out if I could even hold my weapon up which I couldn't. Ooops. Gibbs told me not to talk your ear off." He drank some more of the water and closed his eyes with another sigh.

"Why don't you lie down for a little while, just until Agent Todd gets here." Morrow encouraged, and though DiNozzo gave him a strange and vague look, the younger man complied, and set his bottle of water on the coffee table.

"Wake me when she gets here, please, she's supposed to take me home."

"You mean to Gibbs' place."

"That's what I said, isn't it?"

"Yes, Tony, that's what you said."

Morrow smiled, thinking of how fate had worked to bring Anthony DiNozzo and Jethro Gibbs together on a case in Baltimore three years ago. He himself had been doubtful that the young man would persevere longer than a few weeks, but DiNozzo had proved them all wrong, and surprised them, too, probably not least of all Gibbs himself.

NCISNCISNCISNCISNCISNCIS

"Tony? It's Cate, time to wake up."

Cate crouched down towards her partner, but not too close, as she had witnessed him come up swinging more than once when he had been roused out of a concussive slumber. She kept her voice dulcet in an attempt not to startle him, and he came around with a quiet groan.

"Where's Gibbs?" he mumbled, blinking up at her through thoroughly confused eyes.

"Still at the hospital with Corporal Werth, come on, let's let the Director get back to work."

She helped him up from the sofa, and steadied him while he reached down for is back pack, then steered him out of the small private room Morrow used when he was unable to make it home due to work-related issues.

"Thank you, Director, we really appreciate this, I'll make sure Gibbs calls you when things get sorted out."

"You're welcome, Agent Todd, I'll be waiting to hear from him. Take care of yourself, Agent DiNozzo, don't give your partner a hard time, that's an order."

"Yes sir." Tony muttered quietly on their way out the door as Cate grabbed his backpack when he started listing to the side from carrying it.

"I've got it, Tony, just walk, let's take the elevator instead of the stairs this time, my legs are tired from trying to keep up with Gibbs." she lied easily, knowing she could probably tell him anything in his condition and he would never question her. They stepped into the waiting car and she sent them downwards to the parking garage.

"You got any Junior Mints, Caitie, I'm really hungry for some."

"Uhmm.. No, Tony, I don't, but I will stop and buy you some on the way home if you promise to sit still and stay in the car while I'm in the store."

"Get me Dr. Pepper when you're in there, too. Gibbs said I couldn't have any solids."

"Then you can't have the Junior Mints, Tony."

"But I want them."

"Look," Cate huffed impatiently as she stuffed what just a few hours ago had been a force to reckoned with special agent into the front seat of her Buick. "I'll get you your mints, but you can't have them till we get home, no way are you barfing them back up in my car." She shut the door on him before he could ooze back out of the vehicle and onto the parking lot, then hurried around to the driver's side. She knew that Gibbs had gone through the same thing with Tony more than once, and marveled at the man's ability to take it all in stride with what she knew would become a walking, talking cartoon mess from Loonytown. Well, Gibbs wasn't here this time, and it was her turn to cover Tony's six, to the best of her sisterly skills. "Okay, Tony, buckle up, we're outta here."

_**TO BE CONTINUED...**_


	14. Chapter 14

With every minute that Cate spent keeping one eye on the road and the other on her partner, her respect for her boss grew exponentially. First of all, she had to make sure Tony didn't decide they were stopped when they weren't and try to get out of the car, even though she had locked the door on him. Then she had to make sure he didn't break off the knobs on the dashboard while he tried them all out, taking turns blasting them with hot air, cold air and heavy metal music. He finally settled on a classical station, half-humming, half-whistling to Mendelessohn's Concerto in E Minor, his arms flailing as he directed his imaginary orchestra. She was grateful for the music's ability to keep him occupied, until he suddenly stopped conducting and turned to her with an alarmed look and sickly colored face.

"Caitie, gotta stop!" was all he said, and she knew she needed to pull over immediately. Tires spun up roadside gravel as she hurried to a stop along the rural highway they always took as a short-cut to Gibbs' place, and ran around the car to open up the door for her suddenly bilious partner.

"Tony, unlock the door!" she screamed at him as he fumbled to find the handle, not evening realizing he was locked in. He found the small button and leaned on it, and nearly spilled out of the car like a drunk when Cait immediately swung the door open for him. Stumbling into the ankle high grass, he emptied his stomach of what was left of a heavy breakfast, and was really wishing he had passed on that second burrito, as it had been much more pleasant going down than coming back up. Worse still, the pressure on his broken nose was nearly unbearable, and between the barfing and the pain, he thought he might just lie down roadside and stay there, hopefully dying sooner than later.

Cait did what she could to comfort him, rubbing his back and waiting with a bottle of water from the car, and she grimaced at the moans emanating from the depths of him. When he finally stopped, he toppled over into the grass, not even taking the waiting bottle of water to rinse out his mouth.

"Tony?" Cait asked worriedly as she hovered over his shaking form.

"Where's Gibbs?"

"Tony, Gibbs is -" she started to yell, then realized she was dealing with someone who was less than cognizant of reality. "Gibbs is going to be home soon." she finished. "Come on, let's get you back into the car before someone stops to ask what's going on. Or at least sit up and drink some water."

"Sorry, Caitie.." he answered quietly as he slowly made his way to his knees and took the water from her. "My head hurts like a sonofabitch after that..." Rinsing his mouth several times, he took the smallest drink of water for his raw throat, then tossed the bottle aside ran his hands through his hair.

"Okay. Think I'm..."

He never finished his sentence before a patrol car pulled up behind Cait's Buick, lights flashing and blinding him when he looked up to find the source of the noise.

"Shit." he said flatly, then gave up any pretense of actually caring.

"Maam, mind telling me what's happening here?"

"Yes, Officer, I'm -"

Before she could finish, the LEO had spotted the weapon at her side, and his hand automatically reached for his own.

"Maam, step over to the car, hands behind your head, put your hands on the hood, legs spread apart, do not reach for your weapon."

"Wasn't planning on it, Officer." she grumbled, heading slowly to her car and assuming a position she knew all too well.

"What – no!" Tony sputtered, realizing something wasn't right, but unable to really see what was happening through his double vision and tears. "Cait, what's -"

"Sir, lay down on the ground, on your stomach, hands behind your head."

"What -why, I'm not – we're not -"

"Tony, just shut up and do what he says, just this once, please?" Cait begged as nicely as she could under the circumstances.

"Maam, let me handle him, you keep silent." he commanded, pocketing her Sig in the back of his pants and frisking her for more weapons. "Stay right where you are, maam, my partner will be out to assist me soon as he's done running your tags."

She said nothing, fuming with humiliation and a not a little fear for her partner's safety at the hands of a LEO who had no way of knowing what was really going on with him.

"Please don't hurt him." she told the officer without turning around. "We're federal agents, he was in an altercation with a -"

"Maam, I told you to be quiet!" the LEO barked, growing impatient at her inability to keep quiet.

"Don't you yell at her! I'll knock you out!"

"Tony, shut! Up!" she snapped, turning just enough to see her partner trying to get to his feet and the LEO going after him. She was at a total loss of what to do- risk leaving her position on the car and getting shot both of them shot, or leaving Tony to his own stupid devices and getting himself shot. She was saved having to decide by the other patrol officer getting out of his car and motioning to his partner, just as the man was shoving a belligerent Tony back to the ground and grabbing his wrists behind his back to snap hand cuffs on him.

"Watson, it's cool, they're Feds, at least _she _is."

Officer Watson looked up at his partner from his struggling captive and gave a brutal shove into Tony's ribs with his knee, knocking the wind out of him.

"I thought I told you to stay still!" he roared.

"Hey! That's enough!" Cait shouted, unable to stay out of the fray any longer and heading towards her own hapless partner. "Just get _off _him, he's already been brutalized enough for one day!"

"Maam, I'm just doing my job! The kid is acting like an ass and resisting arrest!"

"Well, then, that job must entail roughing up a fellow LEO, not to mention ex-police detective! Not on any of the police force descriptions I've ever seen!"

The officer held his ground, even in the face of her fury, until he saw the look on his partner's face.

In the meantime, Cait had pulled out her ID, flipped it open, and shoved it in the man's face.

"NCIS Special Agent Caitlyn Todd, and former bodyguard to the President, and that 'kid' you're so smugly roughing up? Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo, Jethro Gibbs' Senior Field Agent."

Watson looked from her over to his partner, who was giving Watson a wide-eyed, worried sort of look.

"The – Jethro Gibbs? The ex-Marine gunny that causes so much trouble for the local PD's?

"Only when it's warranted. Like, now, when he finds out you threw Tony onto the ground when he already had a broken nose and concussion." she supplied in a completely light tone of voice, and then finished with one that was as cold and hard as winter rocks. "Now Get. The. Hell. Off. From. Him."

Officer Watson fairly flew up from Tony's prone and now still body, and fumbled through his pockets to produce his cuff keys, his face nearly as green as Tony's had been before he'd vomited.

"Why the hell didn't you _tell _me who you were?"

"I'm pretty sure I tried!" Cait answered incredulously. "You were too intent on rushing to judgment to let me show you my badge and ID."

"You were still wearing your gun, maam."

"We're required to wear it portal to portal, Officer Watson. _And _I'm still on duty! Had no reason not to be wearing it." She shoved the man aside, not caring if he toppled from the awkward position, and put a gentle hand on the back of her partner's head. "Tony, it's Cait, everything's alright now, the mean officer is under control, I'm going to help you to the car."

Tony opened a loopy eye, only half-aware again of what was happening now that his adrenaline had stopped jacking him up.

" You okay, Caitie?"

"I'm fine. Come on, help me get you up so we can go home, the rate we're going, Gibbs will be there before we are. Come on, up and at 'em." she coaxed, pulling on Tony's arm and hoping he'd get the hint that it was safe to get up.

"You get me some ginger ale at the store and maybe some crackers?"

"Whatever you want if you get up for me. Come on, we're going to have the entire police department here wondering what's going on."

"He shoved me onto my face, Cait. Think my nose needs to be set again."

Cait bit her lip so she wouldn't scream at just about everybody, and helped her partner to his wobbly feet, then stuffed him yet again into the front seat."

"You guys are following us to the e.r just in case we have to pull over again." she told them levelly, daring either one to protest or God forbid, deny her orders. Neither said a word, just climbed back into the cruiser and waited while she buckled Tony into his seat and got back into hers. Gibbs was gonna kill all of them for this.

Before they headed back onto the roadway, she fished through her purse and found the bottle of pills the e.r nurse had given her, and though she had sworn she would never be a party to turning Tony into a blathering idiot with them, she could see no other course of action at the moment. His eyes were clenched shut in what had to be brutal pain from not just the concussion and vomiting, but now a slam into the hard ground.

"Got some headache medicine for you, Tony, found some in my purse." she lied, without really actually lying. She held one out into her hand along with a fresh bottle of water and he took it, dry swallowing it and then taking a shaky sip of the liquid. Freaky thing about Tony on drugs, as much as he hated them, they could almost always slip him more when he was on them. Still, the fact that he hadn't protested at all worried her more than a little.

"Don't wanna go to the E.R." Tony informed her as he huffed through his mouth for air. "Call Ducky. He's set plenty of noses."

Great. When Ducky found out about Tony needing his nose reset, he would want all the details, and then he would inform Gibbs and...the situation was spiraling out of control already and she wasn't even

back to Gibbs' place yet. Well, Ducky would find out about it anyways, and besides, none of this had been her fault, she had followed procedure and...man, how could things go so wrong in the course of just a few hours? This never would have happened if their boss had done _his _job and taken care of his own before haring off to clear a fellow Marine's name.

"Alright. Let me see if he can get away from work for a while."

Speed dialing the M.E., there was a knock on her car window that startled her already frazzled nerves.

The other patrol officer was requesting her to open her window.

"Maam, is everything alright, does he need some assistance now?"

"Just calling his doctor, change of plans." she held up a finger to him, not caring if it looked rude. She was all about rude right at the moment. After several rings, the older man answered.

"Ducky, it's Cait, can you meet us at Gibbs' place, Tony needs his nose reset."

No sense in skirting the issue, might as well rip the Band Aid off, she thought.

"What? Why, did he fall, is he alright?"

"He had a bit of a scuffle with a local LEO, I'll explain it all when I see you, but could you just please come now, he really needs some TLC."

"I will be there as soon as I can, Caitlyn. Get him comfortable and tell him I'm on my way."  
"Thanks, Ducky. See you in a bit."

She pocketed her phone and looked over at Tony, temporarily ignoring the cop at her window.

"Ducky's on his way, Tony. Let's go, I'll stop quick at a 7-11 and get you some soda and snacks."

Tony nodded wordlessly, too exhausted to form a verbal answer.

"Follow me, Officer -" she searched for his name on his uniform. "Bodine. Hmmm. I'll have to remember to tell Tony about that." she smiled wickedly at the man and started up the car.

_**TO BE CONTINUED...Will they ever get to Gibbs' house? Will Tony break into a song and dance in the 7-11? Will we get to see Gibbs hand Officer Watson's head to him on a stick? Stay tuned for our next exciting episode of 'Tony and Cait's Not So Excellent Adventure'!**_


	15. Chapter 15

_**A/N: I know canon Cait's name is Caitlyn. I can't get it out of my brain to spell it Kate, so for the ease of my brain, I'm going to just spell it Kate. Hope no one minds, helps the flow of the writing for me and keeps the spelling the same as I tend to go back and forth and not realize it. **_

_*** A special shout-out to gotgoats for Bobby Sherman's 'Gingerbread Man'!**_

If anyone thought it was odd that Kate's Buick was being followed into a 7-11 parking lot by a black and white police cruiser, she didn't really care. She had witnessed the battering of her already battered partner at the hands of one of them, and if she'd had her way, she would have had them both follow her to wherever the hell Gibbs was and let him deal with them.

Well, Officer Watson, anyways. She knew the man had been doing his job, just as he had stated, and in all honesty, she knew she would have done the same thing under the circumstances. No law enforcement officer could or should ever assume that just because someone tells them they're a fellow officer of the law, they should be believed. Up until Officer Watson had gotten surly with Tony, procedure had been followed, and in reality, a combative suspect was one of a LEO's worst nightmares. Lives were lost on too regular of a basis due to a suspect gaining the upper hand and grabbing weapons in the form of guns or knives or cars and turning the tables on their captors.

Then Kate remembered the knee in Tony's ribcage, and her fury boiled over yet again. It had been done unnecessarily and out of spite, and that was unforgivable in her eyes, especially when it came to it being done to Tony. There was no way the man was going to get out of at least a serious reprimand for it, if not something even more drastic, and she would happily watch Gibbs take his turn with him.

She cut the car engine and looked over at Tony, who was grinning happily at her now. Well, she _was_ the one who had given him that last pill.

"I'm not even going to consider leaving you out here by yourself, especially with Riggs and Murtaugh over there watching out for you. Come on, you're coming with me."

"Yaayyy!" he crowed, and stumbled out of the car, grabbing onto the top of the door to keep from landing on his face. "I need some Twinkies. And lots of Dr. Pepper. My stomach doesn't feel so good. Gibbs buys Dr. Pepper for me to have at his place, but I think I drank it all last weekend. We had a cookout in the back yard. He has a nice fireplace, I helped him build it, it's made out of brick, has a grill you can slide out of it and everything. I ate four hot dogs. Plus some potato salad. Kinda grosses me out now to think of it. Better not think about it."

"Tony, shhh, just for a minute, please. Concentrate on what you want for a snack. Remember, this is for later, you can't have solids for quite a while yet."

"Not hungry, Katie. Just want some Dr. Pepper. Twinkies are for later."

"Alright. Find the Twinkies, then. I'll get some chips and the Dr. Pepper. And _do not _leave the store without me, do you understand, Tony? Hey! Look at me and tell me you understand what I just told you."

"Go find the Twinkies and do not leave the store without you."

"Alright, go, I'll meet you up at the counter."

Tony gave her a crazy grin and took off, as if he had never been tackled to the ground and lambasted twice in the past four hours. She once again gave credit where it was due to Gibbs for handling a loony tunes DiNozzo. Heading down the chips aisle, she was lost in the multitude of flavors and sizes, and was about to make a decision when she heard Tony's voice floating above her head from two aisles over.

"It's Doctor Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, we hope you will enjoy the show...Dr. Pepper's one and only lonely hearts club band...sit back and let the evening go..."

"Tony, no singing in the store." she called over to him.

"Really? People can't sing in stores?"

"Not in 7-11s. One of Gibbs' rules, remember? Think it's Rule 26 or something."

"Uhhh. Oh. Okay. Found the Twinkies!" he yelled back at her, and she cringed again and grabbed up three bags of anything that said 'chips' on them and hurrying to find the soda aisle.

Just as she reached out for the largest container of Tony's current favorite carbonated beverage, she heard a loud crash and without a doubt knew that it was her partner in some sort of predicament.

She threw the bags of chips aside and ran to help him, finding him on his hands and knees gathering up Twinkies and a spilled rack of packaged cookies.

"Sorry, Katie.." he apologized in a quiet voice. "It jumped out in front of me, I couldn't stop in time for it!"

Hell, she did _not _need one more mess to clean up, and suddenly she found herself wondering if she indeed wanted children in her future plans. This _had _to be what it was like toting a toddler around.

"It's okay, Tony, don't worry about it, you didn't break anything, just put them back neatly on the rack."

And he did try, but his eyes wouldn't coordinate with his hands, or maybe it was vice versa, and the ones he put back up looked worse than when they had been on the floor. Nevermind, she thought, she'd just explain the situation to the manager and all would be fine.

"Look, Katie, soft gingerbread cookies! I love gingerbread! Remember when you made those cookies and brought them to work, I ate almost all of them myself!"

"I remember, Tony. Come on, just leave them and let's go, Ducky's going to get there before we do and he'll be annoyed that he hurried."

"Okay!" Tony readily agreed, grabbing up the left over Twinkies and a few packs of the gingerbread cookies. Kate rolled her eyes, but let it go, and nudged him towards the check out counter.

"Go put your stuff on the counter and WAIT FOR ME! I'm going back for the Dr. Pepper."

Tony obeyed, and dumped his armload of Twinkies and cookies on the counter to the surprise of the young clerk at the register. There was over a dozen packages of Twinkies, and four packs of gingerbread cookies.

"I like Twinkies! So does my boss, even though he says he doesn't eat junk like that. I've seen him eat three packages when we're doing paperwork late at night. I keep a bunch in my desk drawer for nights like that. I have to keep a lot of phones in my file drawer too cause he breaks them all the time. He thinks they're indestructible, like him, banging them on his desk and the car dashboard and anything else he can find that's hard enough to ruin their insides. He would say that one of those things would be my head, but he's never hit me with one of them. Kate, where are you, this guy's waiting for us, we're holding up the line!"

"It's okay, dude," the young clerk assured him. "You're the only one in here now, take your time!"

She cringed again just as she picked up the three bags of chips she had abandoned before, and headed towards the check out with the soda in her other hand.

"Sorry about that." she smiled at the kid behind the counter. "He got hurt on the job, I'm trying to get him home, but we keep having catastrophes."

The youth leaned over the counter past Tony and spoke into her ear.

"Does he really want all these Twinkies?"

"Oh, yeah, that's fine, throw them in a bag. He'll have them gone in no time." she assured him, and took out her wallet, deciding on her credit card for this unexpected foray into junk food.

"I can pay for it, Katie. Gibbs gave me my wallet back at the hospital."

"I know, Tony." she told him gently, squeezing his forearm. "We can figure it out later, right now let's just get you home." She handed the clerk her card, keeping one hand on her partner's arm. "Can you grab a styrofoam cup for me so he can have a drink in the car, please? With a straw and a lid?"

"Sure, no problem." he chirped, and hurried to grab them while the machine spit out her card receipt.

"Here's your card back, just sign here, if you want you can put some ice from the self-serve in the cup."

"Thank you, we appreciate it. Tony, take the cup and – you know what, nevermind." she finished, having visions of three gallons of ice spewed out on the tile floor. "Stand right here and hold the bag while I get some ice for you."

He waited patiently for her as she made her way to the self-serve drink machine, looking in the bag at the treasure trove of Twinkies and cookies. Momentarily forgetting her other order from before, another song popped into his head, from where he couldn't fathom, nor could he stop it.

"Feel like I'm made out of gingerbread, uh huh, uh huh, crumb pickin', lip lickin' gingerbread...can't think of rainy weather now...finally got myself together now.." he dropped the bag on the counter and spread his arms and legs out wide for his finale. "fresh out of the pan, sweet gingerbread man...uh huh, uh huh..." he crooned, loud and happy for everyone to see, and the young clerk turned from temporarily shocked to appreciative audience, clapping his hands and laughing.

"That was cool, dude, I never heard that before, was that like, Muddy Waters or Leon Redbone or somebody?"

"Mmmm...Bobby Sherman, I think. Bubble gum heartthrob, seventies. Waayyyy before you were born, dude. Maybe even before _I _was born! Spun sugary cloud I'm floatin' on, sun's spreadin' my suit of sugar coatin' on. All tasty and tan, sweet gingerbread man -"

"Tony, enough, let's go, Ducky's waiting for us, remember?"

"Ducky's waiting for us? Why is he waiting for us, Kate?"

"He wants to look at your nose. C'mon, out to the car, let's go." she grabbed his arm, and he grabbled his bag of Twinkies while she dragged him along.

"Fresh out of the pan, SWEET GINGERBREAD MA-A-A-NNN!" he finished off for the entire block to hear as she stuffed his lanky frame yet again into the passenger's seat and shut the door before he could escape and finish his one-man show.

"Officers, I think we're okay from here on in, just need to go a few more blocks. Officer Watson, you _will _be hearing from Special Agent Gibbs, and I suggest you get your affairs in order, cause you're not gonna know what hit you when he comes looking for you." she informed him sweetly, but the look in her eye was deadly. "I can pretty much guarantee you won't be kneeing someone in the ribs anytime soon."

Officer Watson gulped audibly in spite of his determination to return a steely glare to the woman lecturing him about his fate, and she smiled evilly at him.

"Have a good day, Officers. Thanks for the escort."

"Yes maam." both of them chimed quietly as she made her way back to her car and hurriedly climbed in to start it before her partner could think of climbing out. "Okay, Tony, let's get you to Ducky so he can set your nose before the – while you're still – you know, hand me your cup, let me pour you some Dr. Pepper to drink on the way there."

He watched her in fascination, as if she was conducting a science experiment, and she fit the plastic lid on it, popped the straw into it, and handed it to him.

"Don't chugalug it, okay, you'll end up puking it all up if you do." she ordered, stowing the rest of the bottle in a crate behind the passenger's seat.

"Thanks, Katie. You're the best. I'm really glad Gibbs asked you to be on our team. I wasn't at first, at first I was jealous, and then I decided I could share him since your dad was far away in Indiana, and you didn't get to see him that often. I like your sister Rachael, though sometimes when she looks at me I get the feeling she's trying to figure me out and then fix what's wrong with me, and it gives me a bad feeling, like she'll tell you secrets that I don't want anyone to know, especially you and the Boss."

"She would never do that, Tony. And she thinks you're just fine, she doesn't think you're any more messed up than the rest of us. Drink your soda before you spill it."

"You think I'm crazy, Kate?"  
"No, Tony, cause then that would make _me _crazy for working with _two _crazy people instead of just one."

"Haha, yeah, you're right, Katie!" he laughed, and took a long gulp of his Dr. Pepper. He was quiet for a time as they drove, and she thought perhaps that at last his batteries had run down when suddenly he screamed into the air. "All abooaarrrdd! Ay ay ay ay ay...mental wounds still screaming, driving me insane! I'm going off the rails on a crazy train! Bodup bump bah! I know that things are going wrong for me...you gotta listen to my wooo-rds! Mental wounds not healing, who and what's -to blame! I'm goin' off the rails on a crazy train! Bodup bump bump baaahhh!"

He stopped suddenly and took another drink of his soda, his head still bobbing to his private beat of Ozzy's 'Crazy Train', while Kate sincerely hoped nothing else jarred his considerable inventory of songs and their lyrics.

"Thanks for the Twinkies, Kate, got – let's see." he peered at his wrist like a drunk in a bar. "Nineteen hours and...eight minutes before I can have them. Don't let Gibbs eat them all before then."

"I won't, Tony, I promise." she smiled and heaved a weary sigh. The first thing she got the chance, she was going to ask Gibbs how he managed a concussed DiNozzo.

_**To Be Continued...hope you liked it!**_


	16. Chapter 16

Kate was a little amazed when they pulled into Gibbs' driveway without incident – well, without one more than they'd already had. For the rest of their drive from the 7-11, she had been treated to an eclectic mix of music in renditions that only Tony could deliver under the influence of legal drugs.

She'd always taken him for a classical and jazz kind of guy, but she realized he must have spent time listening to all sorts of music during his years in college. "Gimme Three Steps" by Leonard Skinnard was belted out his open car window, which suddenly switched to Led Zepplin's "Black Dog" and midway through the second verse, switched over to "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot". How any of them had a thing in common with each other, she couldn't tell, but it didn't matter, she had to listen to them no matter what.

Getting out of the car now, he was gracing her with his bizarre version of 'If I Had A Million Dollars' by the Bare Naked Ladies, and she took him by the elbow to guide him into Gibbs' house.

"Isn't that the greatest name for a band, Katie, Bare Naked Ladies? I mean, they're all guys, what does it have to do with anything?"

"I really don't know, Tony, you should ask Gibbs when you see him."

"Gibbs is here, I didn't see his car, just Ducky's. Which is just ducky. Get it? Just ducky?"

"Yes, Tony, I get it." she humored him as they got inside the house. "Ducky, it's Kate and Tony, you in the kitchen?"

"Yes, my dear, having a cuppa while I was waiting." he informed as he came out to greet them. "Oh, Anthony, look at you, my poor boy, come, let's get you situated on your sofa downstairs."

"When is Gibbs coming home?" he whined, ambling down to the basement with the guidance of Ducky at his elbow and Kate following behind.

"I should think that he'd be here any time now, now come, sit, let Ducky have a look at you."

Tony obeyed, starting to wind down from the sheer exhaustion of singing and talking so much.

"Cop broke my nose again." he huffed as he sat, and crossed his arms in annoyance. "I wasn't even doing anything, cops aren't supposed to do that to people, I never did it to anyone who wasn't resisting arrest. Gives cops a bad name. Don't tell Gibbs, he'll-"

"What – is he remembering correctly, Caitlyn, or is this a delusion from the pain killer?"

"No delusion, Ducky!" Tony answered defiantly before Kate could. "She only gave me one of her pills out of her purse."

Ducky looked at her questioningly and she shook her head and mouthed 'later' to him and he nodded.

"Asshole broke my sunglasses when he pushed my down."he grumbled, fumbling in his pocket for his crushed pair of Ray Bans.

"Tony!" Kate exclaimed in surprise. She had never heard him use coarse language around her, no matter what other rude things she felt he did during their work day.

"Caitlyn, he's not himself, you know that." Ducky chided quietly.

"Then who am I? Can I be you, Ducky? I say, Jethro, perhaps you should consider switching to decaffeinated tea for just a few days..Or I can be Gibbs.. Do that one more time, DiNozzo, yer gonna be walkin' around with my boot up your ass fer a week!" he gave his best growly Boss impersonation while trying to affix his mangled sunglasses on his equally mangled nose. "Ah-hooww, Ducky, that hurt!"

"Well of course it did, Anthony, your nose is in a bit of a sad state. Give your glasses to Caitlyn, she'll keep good care of them while I fix your poor sneezer and tell me exactly what happened that I need to redo the other doctor's good work."

"I had to puke."

"Anthony, let Caitlyn tell me please." the M.E admonished gently.

"He had to puke. I pulled over to the side of the road, a patrol car stopped to see if we needed assistance, one of the officers saw my weapon, made me assume the position against my car, Tony started yelling at him to leave me alone, the officer left me to deal with him, and then shoved him to the ground and cuffed him. Then went the extra mile and kneed him in the ribs just for the hell of it."

"Oh _dear, _Anthony, you have had a wretched day. When I am done with your nose, I'll look at your ribs. Just – hold – still – for..." There was a sob of pain from his patient which he steeled himself to. " ...and there you are. All better now."

"You didn't _say _you were going to hurt me! Everybody's hurting me today! Kate, _tell him, _ no more hurting me!"

"I'm dreadfully sorry, Anthony, but we can't have that beautiful nose of yours bent out of shape, it just wouldn't suit you!"

"I'm telling Gibbs. I'm telling him about you and that idiot cop and..."

"Young man, you will calm down and let me look at your ribcage now."

"No! It's fine, it's just a bruise, I just wanna lie down and go to sleep, why won't anyone let me just _do _that, Kate, when is Gibbs coming home?"

"He's home now, Anthony. What seems to be the problem?"

Gibbs' voice was calm, level, but it held some iron in it.

"I – he -" Tony swallowed hard involuntarily, and looked down at his crumpled sunglasses. "Nothing, Boss."

"Doesn't sound like it to me. Let Ducky look at your ribs. You should have told me before that they were hurt."

"They weren't _hurt_ before that stupid _idiot _slammed me down and dislocated my nose again! _And _broke my favorite sunglasses."

"Anthony, have a drink of water and lie down, I can look at your ribs while you're lying on the couch."

Gibbs' eyes traveled suspiciously between his old friend and Kate, and both of them fidgeted nervously, not willing to see an already edgy Gunny go totally off the rails.

"What -the – hell- is – going on! Who hurt him besides Corporal Werth?"

"It was just a misunderstanding, Boss, no need to go all...Corporal Werth!" Tony giggled, finding his sudden comparison quite amusing. "Bee Tee W, how _is _the illustrious Corporal Werth, Gunny Gibbs, you gonna get 'im fired from the Marines and bring 'im onto your team, make him your new SFA?"

"An-thony!" Ducky gasped.

"Tony, what's the matter with you?" Kate joined in with her own disbelief.

"I saw the way Gibbs tore off after we subdued him. So sure he'd been framed, and find out who had it out for the guy."

"Tony, you need to shut up right about now." Gibbs warned.

"That an order, Gunny? Gonna bust me down to Probie cause I'm not a big, bad Marine like Corporal Punishment there? Can't all be jarheads, somebody's gotta be the ole' Saint Bernard."

"Tony, that's enough!" Gibbs' voice echoed hard around the basement walls. "That _is _an order! What the hell is going on with you, anyways?"

"Jethro, he has a major concussion and a broken nose. He's been given some 'pain relievers' for it."

Suddenly it dawned on Gibbs just what was causing the surprising behavior from his second and he relented a bit.

"Sorry, Boss." Tony all but whispered. "Can't seem to shut up. Thought it was just a Motrin or something, Katie said she found it in her purse. Doesn't feel like a Motrin."

"Lie down like Ducky told ya and let him look at your ribs. And keep quiet. I don't wanna hear any more of that 'replacing you with Corporal Werth' bullshit. Where the hell would you get an idea like that from?"

There was no answer from the figure now lying on the couch.

"Anthony, Jethro asked you a question."

"Told me to keep quiet." he replied sullenly.

"Check his ribs out, Duck, make sure he should even be lying down. Kate, tell me what the hell is going on, and we're not done with this conversation, DiNozzo, soon as she's done, you're up."

He turned to his probie expectantly while he helped Ducky get Tony back into a sitting position and gently pull his shirt off.

"Tony got sick and we had to pull over, some highway patrol officers spotted us, stopped to see what was going on and -"

"He took her weapon and made her assume the position, Boss, then he kept telling her to be quiet.

Gibbs nodded wordlessly, but his mind was putting together what he was pretty sure had been the scene at the roadside disaster.

"You tried to defend her and the cop thought you were drunk and disorderly and resisting arrest."

"Didn't try to cause trouble, Boss, I swear, just wanted to help Katie! He pushed me down and my face hit the ground then he cuffed me."

Ducky saw the lead agent's eyes narrow and turn flinty, and fleetingly wondered if he should abandon his doctoring and go pour Gibbs a couple fingers of Jack.

"Were you yelling at him, Tony?" he asked gently.

"Yes, but -"

"Were you fighting him? Threatening him physically?"

"No, Gibbs, I saw the whole thing, I was -"

"Kate. Let him tell me."

"No, Boss, I was lying on my stomach like he told me to do. I had to, I didn't have my weapon, and he'd already taken Kate's. I didn't want him to get jumpy and hurt her, but then he started yelling at her cause she was talking to me, so I yelled at him to quit doing it and tried to get up and -"

"I get the rest of the picture, Tony. What about the knee in the ribs?"

"That was totally uncalled for, Gibbs, his partner had already told him who we were and I showed them my ID, so he knew Tony wasn't a threat to them. I just think he didn't like Feds is all." she finished bitterly, having had first hand experience in dealing with some of the local police force regarding jurisdiction over cases and sharing information on them.

"Nothing seems to be cracked or broken, Jethro, just badly bruised. But quite unnecessary harshness, none the less. You don't kick a man when he's down and in handcuffs."

Gibbs eyed the spectacular bruising that was forming along with already-formed contusions courtesy of Damon Werth when Tony had jumped in front of his boss to shield him from the brunt of the wild Corporal's considerable wrath. He knew for a fact that most cops were like Tony, dedicated and determined to do their job to the best of their abilities, but that was always a bad apple in the bunch like in any other law enforcement agency. This particular officer had had the bad luck of roughing up one of Gibbs' family, and the man's ire burned hot under the surface of his calm exterior.

"I'll deal with it, Duck. What about his nose?"

"It should be fine unless he has another altercation with some other idiot. Honestly, this is his reward for a job well done? Caitlyn, would you be so kind as to go find him some pajamas, I believe you'll find a pair in the bureau drawer of the downstairs guest room."

Kate hurried up the stairs on her newest mission, happy to be away from the tension radiating from Gibbs' body like live waves of energy. As much as she wanted Patrolman Watson to suffer for his stupidity, she didn't want any more bloodshed, especially at the hands of her boss. Come to think of it, though, she wouldn't have minded a crack at the bully herself. She'd have to talk to Gibbs about that.

Entering the guest room, she was surprised to find it much different than the night she had spent there before finding an apartment closer to NCIS after she was hired. What had once been a bedroom disguised as a storage room had been transformed into a repainted, re-carpeted 'hang-out'. The twin bed had been replaced by a double with boisterous bedding, and she had to admit she was tempted to try out the thing, all piled with down comforter and pillows and a cozy blanket folded up at the foot of the bed.

Mementos were interspersed with books, DVDs, and CDs, and original artwork graced the walls along with framed personal photos of the team and others she didn't recognize. Feeling a bit like a voyeur, she made her way to the dresser and poked around for some clean nightwear, laughing when she landed on a pair of flannel pjs. So much for the silk ones Tony claimed to be so fond of wearing!

She grabbed some warm socks and a pair of slippers and hurried back down to the basement, feeling a weird sense of warm satisfaction that Tony had found a safe haven in Gibbs' house. She had never felt the lack of family or what it was like to not have the security of a real home to turn to when things got too out of control, and knew that Tony counted on his team along with Abby and Ducky to keep him from slipping between the cracks. She would have to quietly commend her boss when the dust from this gawdawful case settled down.

"Got your flannels, it's kind of cool down here." she stated, handing the pile of clothes to Ducky for him to help Gibbs put them on her partner. "I'm going to go make some coffee and find something to eat, I'll put the tea kettle back on for you, Ducky."

She retreated upstairs, much happier with the domestic end of the situation than having to be a part of the storm brewing in the basement.

_**TO BE CONTINUED...One last chapter of Gibbs telling Tony what he found out about Corporal Werth and giving him a verbal head slap for being so insecure. And of course, there will be a visit with Officer Watson to sort him out, too. Stay tuned..it should be posted within the next couple of days.**_


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N: Like I said in the original chap to this story arc, it's based very loosely on the orig. ep, which I thought stunk. (yeah, I know, I say that about every episode since**

**Season 2!) I didn't really think Werth should have been rewarded for resorting to steroids to reach his goals in the Marine Corps. It's not tolerated in sports, or any other venue, so why should Gibbs give Werth a medal for unsportsman like behavior when the rest of the Marines had to use just their will power and determination to accomplish heroic feats? Just sayin...**

**Anyways, thanks to all who have reviewed, alerted and favorited this story.**

**Thought this was going to be the last chap, but I guess there's one more coming after this, of Gibbs helping Officer Watson see the error or his ways.**

Gibbs was relieved when Kate volunteered to be in charge of coffee and snacks, knowing that Tony would certainly not appreciate having her as an audience to his drugged out angst. As usual, his second had read too much into into his boss's actions, and once again, Gibbs had been oblivious to the storm brewing in the young man's head. There wasn't really any way he could have known what was happening, as he'd spent the last several hours trying to get to the bottom of Corporal Damon Werth's violent behavior, and left Tony in Kate's care. He knew that Kate was a more than competent care-giver for Tony; both she and Abby fawned over him, much to Tony's fussing and protesting, but Gibbs knew that secretly, his SFA sucked up every second of it he could get.

But something about Werth had raised his protective hackles, in spite of the fact that the young Marine had broken Tony's nose, which Gibbs knew from experience was excruciatingly painful, and often deadly when done at the hands of a highly trained warrior. His famous gut had screamed a warning to him that this wasn't a simple guy hooked on illegal drugs situation, and he'd held back the urge to pound the Marine into the ground for hurting Tony. Leaving his youngest agent in the care of Ducky and Kate, he'd done some hard questioning and digging, and gotten to what he was pretty sure was the root of the case.

Tony must have sensed Gibbs' need to protect Werth, seemingly over him, as he was pretty much always with his SFA through the thick and thin of any injury serious enough to land him in the emergency room. Abandoning Tony to help Corporal Werth had hit a raw nerve in his young agent, and with his system flooded with prescription pain killers, Tony wasn't able to think things through in a more logical, less emotional manner. Gibbs knew he got like that, and should have called him to make sure all was okay in the feelings department, but the time it would have taken to talk through Tony's loopy, wandering brain was better spent dealing with the case at hand. Or so he had thought, until he heard his second's accusations come out of his mouth.

He ran a few different ideas through his head as he helped Ducky get the dirty jeans and bloodied shirt off DiNozzo and replace them with pajamas and socks, no mean feat with Tony's flopping arms and legs and uncooperative attitude.

"DiNozzo, _enough!" _Gibbs barked impatiently, annoyed with himself and the whole situation. "Sit still and let us get these on you, you're worse than a two year old!"

"Sorry, Boss." Tony mumbled dejectedly. "Where's Kate, she can help me."

"Jethro, really." Ducky admonished quickly. "He is exhausted and under the influence, he can't help that his body and mind are betraying him at the moment." The M.E knew his friend was still stinging from Tony's words and the way the situation had spiraled out of control, and needed to head things off at the pass, so to speak.

"I know, Duck, just – none of this should have happened, it was idiocy all around."

"Wasn't tryin' to be an idiot, Boss."

"I know, Tony. Lie down, put your legs up on the couch." Gibbs encouraged, his voice decidedly gentler now. "I'll ask Kate to make you some hot chocolate."

"She already did, she always makes it for me when I don't feel good."

Both Gibbs and Ducky smiled, amused at, and proud of, Tony's unwavering faith in his partner covering his collective six, be it taking Gibbs to task for an overly-harsh reprimand given in the heat of the moment, or making sure Tony got his chocolate fix. Squabble though they did in the bullpen and company vehicle, neither one let anyone take a poke at the other and get away with it, not even a fellow law officer.

"Smell it now, she must be bringing it to me."

Gibbs couldn't help but chuckle at his SFA's observation. Lying down with eyes closed, DiNozzo knew Kate was headed down the stairs with a large mug of hot cocoa. She stood in front of him, waiting for him to sit up to hold it before relinquishing it.

"Mmmm..."he hummed, carefully holding it up to his nose with his eyes still closed. "Marshmallows."

"There were three left in the bag, looks like somebody had more than hotdogs at your last cookout."

He opened his eyes and smiled up at her with gratitude.

"Thanks, Katie. Don't suppose I could have a Twinkie with it."

"Anthony, you know the rules." Ducky cautioned.

"I'll make some tea for you, Ducky, water's probably boiling by now."

"Let me go with you, Caitlyn, you know how fussy I am about my tea. I assume you would like a mug of coffee, Jethro?"

"Bring me the whole pot. There's a carafe in the pantry."

Ducky smiled and nodded as he followed Kate up the stairs and to the kitchen, leaving Gibbs to try to sort out the events of the day with his youngest agent. He trusted the man to keep a cool enough head now to put Tony straight as to where his boss's loyalties lay, and knew if there _was_ any raising of his voice to his SFA in his battered condition, that Kate would be down the stairs and in Gibbs' face in an instant.

Gibbs settled himself at the end of the sofa with a heavy sigh, and propped Tony's feet up on his lap before tossing the quilt on the back of the sofa over his shaking half asleep agent. He rubbed Tony's leg soothingly, hoping the contact would settle the younger man and ground him.

"Didn't mean to abandon you today, DiNozzo."

"Then why did you?" Tony challenged, staring into his hot cocoa.

"Had to do my job, Tony."

"Could've had Pacci take over for you, they weren't working on anything big."

"Needed to see it through myself. Something was telling me it wasn't just a Marine gone bad, I mean, that he wasn't an every day drug user."

"And?"

"I was right."

"Course you were. He was framed by his fellow Marines, somebody slipped it in his orange juice."

"He was doping himself. With steroids. Wanted to be the biggest, baddest Marine out there. Turns out, he only got in the Corps by taking the steroids, then didn't know enough to stop taking them. Did a lot of heroic things in combat in Iraq, though."

"So that makes his abusing steroids okie dokie." Tony replied, his voice betraying anger and disbelief.

"Didn't _say _that, Tony. Just saying – hell, I dunno what I'm saying. He's getting let go from the Corps, his PTSD is too severe, and the steroids made it worse."

"Hmm. Gonna hire 'im like you did Kate when she got fired from the Secret Service?"

"Tony, what the hell has got – nevermind, I know what's got into you. Not gonna hire him, Tony. He'll be discharged and placed in some sort of rehab program, then they'll help him find a job outside the Corps. Some Senator wanted to give him a medal, that got thrown out the window when they found out he'd come by his heroism in a less than legit way."

"Huh. Imagine that. The cheater didn't actually win this time around."

"Sounds like this is about more than just you being mad about him breaking your nose and me feeling sorry for _him _instead."

"I've had my fill of cheaters, both with test scores and steroids, Boss. Dealt with them in military school, watched them get scholarships for college and play on my team and everybody else's. Meanwhile, guys like me were busting our asses with the talent we were given and nothing else other than a lot of blood, sweat and tears. Not gonna feel sorry for him. He made his choices." Tony stated flatly, then took a gulp of cocoa.

"Yuhp, he did. Getting kicked out of the Corps is gonna be harsh punishment for him, it was what he lived for."

"Yeah, well, I don't cotton to having my nose cartilage shoved up into my eye sockets by an out of control Marine, he could've killed you guys, he didn't even care that he was fixing to toss a woman across the gym floor. Don't care what happens to him, Boss. My head feels like it's gonna fall off, my brain feels like I'm stuffed in between two mattresses and I'm hallucinating from asphyxiation, and my hands are shaking so bad I can barely keep from knocking my teeth out with the mug each time I get a drink. Not to mention my best sunglasses are toast."

"I'll get you a new pair, Tony."

"Boss, they're hundred and fifty dollar glasses, don't you dare go buying a new pair for me."

"Never said I was gonna buy them. Said I get you a new pair. Go on, drink the rest of your cocoa, I'll sit here with you till you get to sleep, then work on the boat for a while."

"I'd like that, Boss. Sorry about the 'replacing' me crap. Stuff's been spewing out of my mouth worse than usual, I haven't been able to edit my brain before my mouth opens. I don't think that was a Motrin Kate gave me. She let me come in the 7-11 with her, bought me some Twinkies and Dr. Pepper, let me hang out the window singing the entire way home. Here. The entire way_ here._"

"Finish your hot chocolate. I've got your six, I'm not going anywhere until you're ready to get rid of me."

"Thanks, Boss. Felt kinda weird not having you watching out for me this afternoon."

"Sounds like Kate did a pretty good job in my place."

"She was really patient with me, Boss. I was an idiot most of the time. Think I sang everything from AD/DC to ZZTop."

"Nope, no AC/DC, Tony." Kate assured, putting a carafe of coffee and some Motrin on the table for them. "You _were _an idiot, though. But you were a sweet idiot. Want more hot cocoa?"

"Nope, I'm good, Katie, thanks." Tony assured her. "Gonna sleep for a while while the Boss here plots his revenge on Officer Watson."

"Alright, then, I'm going to head for home. Call me if you need me, Gibbs."

"Will do, Agent Todd, thanks for getting him home."

"Almost didn't. There's a bag of Twinkies on the kitchen counter, don't eat them all, and don't let him have any till tomorrow."

"I know the drill, Kate, goodnight. Tell Ducky to go home, too. We'll be fine now. I'll call you in the morning."

"Got it. Make sure he sleeps in his bed tonight and not on this ratty couch. Goodnight, Tony. See you tomorrow."

"Nothing wrong with this couch, Katie. It's got history. And culture. And.."

Gibbs reached out and took the mug from his seconds' hands before it dropped into Tony's lap, and set it on the coffee table as Kate gently pushed her sleeping partner the rest of the way down onto the sofa and covered him with the afghan.

"I'll be back in the morning with breakfast." she whispered to Gibbs. "You come up with a good plan for Watson or I will."

He nodded grimly at her, and she knew by the look in his eye that the man already had things well under way to take care of the errant patrolman. It's all she needed to know to keep her from lying awake all night plotting her own payback for the man who had become a surrogate brother to her.

She would find out after the fact exactly what fate Officer Watson suffered at the hands of her boss.

_**To be continued...**_


	18. Chapter 18

Gibbs had waited for a good half hour before gently moving Tony's feet off his lap and heading over to work on the boat. While he made sure Tony was sleeping deeply, he had drank a couple mugs of coffee, thinking over the day's wild events and trying to come up with a suitable punishment for the over-eager Officer Watson. Gibbs knew nothing about the man. Perhaps he was young, or a rookie, or both, and had had a momentary lapse in good judgment. Nowadays things got tricky out in the field, and you never knew what suspects were going to pull out of their sleeves on you, literally and figuratively.

Still, from what Kate had attested to, there was no reason for him to have kneed Tony in the ribs hard enough to leave heavy bruising, as he had already been subdued and posed no threat other than his mouth going off. The thought of his kids being treated like common criminals, and then Tony being shoved to the ground and his already broken nose being jarred out of its placement made Gibbs' hand clutch his sanding block just a bit too tightly for comfortable working conditions.

He checked his watch. 20:00. Hmm. Still pretty early yet. Digging out his cell, he punched a speed dial number, and smirked to himself when the man answered.

"Whataya need, Gibbs? I was just heading out to dinner."

"Hot date with the Burger Shack?"

"Jethro..." Fornell warned.

"Need you to run a check on a local LEO, a patrol officer named Watson. Think Kate said his first name was Ethan."

"That's it? That's all ya got? What's he wanted for?"

"Assault on a federal agent."

"You run 'im off the road after he pulled you over for speeding, Jethro?"

"No, Tobias, he slammed Tony to the ground and shoved his knee into his ribcage, _after _he had Tony in cuffs."

"Jee-zus, Gibbs, what the hell'd the kid do to deserve that?"

"Nothing, Tobias. He and Kate were pulled over to the side of the road so he could puke and the patrol car stopped to check on them, saw Kate's weapon, took it from her, and made her assume the position on her car hood. Tony was still on the ground, but tried to help her. He was on high on pain killers, got his nose broken earlier by an out of control suspect, so he'd been given some in the emergency room."

"Thought you knew not to give him that shit, Jethro."

"He was in agony, Tobias, have you ever gotten your nose broken?"

"Can't say that I've had the pleasure, no. So he got mouthy with the patrol officer, and? Did he get physically combative?"

"Not according to Kate. She said he was on the ground cuffed when the guy slammed his knee into Tony's ribcage. Just did it cause he could, and probably cause he'd just found out he was a Fed. Tell me, Tobias, when did the line between agencies cross over into brutality instead of just trash talk?"

"Don't know, Jethro. What's your boy say about it all, does he want to press charges?"

"Haven't asked him. He's sleeping now, and wasn't in any condition to think about it. Doesn't matter, he presses charges, the rest of them circle the wagons and he gets a verbal reprimand. Want something a little more lasting than that so he doesn't do it again, to anybody."

"So whataya need?" Fornell asked, not even interested in knowing what Gibbs had planned. Better to not know, plausible deniability and all that.

"Just want you to find out what precinct he works in, who his boss is, if he's got any past record of unreasonable force, you know the drill. I'd have Kate do it but I'm afraid she'd go without me and kill him. Don't want her in prison, Tony'd be even more miserable. Don't let Abby know, either, I don't even wanna think of the mayhem they would cause going after him."

"Does DiNutso know how lucky he is having those two rockheads for older sisters?"

"He knows. And milks it for all it's worth whenever he gets the chance."

"Well, I'd say now is one of those chances. I'll get on it right now, I'm still at work, got nothing else to do. Shouldn't take me long, I'll stop by in the morning and bring the kid some breakfast, let you know what I found out."

"Thanks, Tobias. No burritos, it's what he barfed up roadside, don't think he's gonna wanna look at one for a while."

"Got it, see you in the morning."

Gibbs flipped the phone shut without a farewell, knowing without even thinking that Fornell wasn't expecting one and walked back over to the plaid couch to check on his agent before going to work on the boat. Tony seemed to be sleeping placidly enough, even though he had to breathe through his mouth and snore. Gibbs smiled down on him in spite of the situation, picturing each of his agents itching to shoot Watson for going after the other one. Gibbs had never really expected the closeness between the two of them, hadn't really even thought about it at first.

He had hired Kate for her brains and boldness, and her ability to admit that she had screwed up by breaking the rules, but the way she had snarked at Tony during their first investigation, and then Tony's growing jealousy towards her, Gibbs had wondered if he'd made a mistake in inviting her onto the team. But after surviving each other during some wrenching cases, and then getting together for a few cook outs orchestrated by Abby for team bonding, a groove started to form with them, and they'd fallen into a fairly strong sibling relationship, much to Gibbs' relief. He'd dreaded having to let her go and then try to find a suitable replacement, besides the fact that she had taken some of the burden from him of keeping Tony on the straight an narrow. Excellent agent that he was, he could be high maintenance when it came to his physical and emotional well-being.

Abby had already taken the lead in adopting Tony as her younger brother, and was unswervingly loyal and protective of him, as he was of her. For once something had gone right in Gibbs' universe, and he wasn't too proud to give a frequent silent thanks to the powers that be for bringing them all together.

They were his family now, and he wasn't about to not be there for any of them, even it meant steppping over the line a little to let everyone know what would happen if they messed with them. He had done much worse years ago for his Shannon and Kelly, a secret he would hopefully carry to his grave. A little 'friendly persuasion' would go a long ways here in D.C to keep his new family safe, at least off the job. On the job, he would step in front of a bullet for them without a second thought.

He got to work sanding and gluing, and found a rhythm and pace that suited his fatigue and ill-temper while he sipped his Jack and kept watch of his youngest agent. The kid would be a bear in the morning, hung over from the concussion, pain killers and adrenaline rushes. Seldom was Tony ever irritable, but he had his moments, especially at times like this. Not even Abby and Kate's coddling could sooth him at first, but Gibbs would make sure he stuffed the kid with some Twinkies and hot tea to get him jump-started again, and eventually Tony would be his usual agreeable self.

Gibbs woke hours later to a noise filtering into his dreams, and was alert and ready for action within seconds, only to find he was back on the couch with DiNozzo's feet on his lap and the kid churning around entangled in his blankets.

"Easy, Tony, you're okay, you're on your couch."

"Kate's okay?"

"Kate's fine, she's home sleeping." Gibbs rubbed his face and looked at his watch. "Well, she might be up and around by now, it's almost six."

"Head hurts. Nose hurts. Mouth tastes like a gerbil died in it."

"Concussion. Broken nose. Pain killers."

"Unh." Tony grunted and put his head back in under the blankets. "Gotta pee. Need a drink."

Get yourself up, I'll follow you up the stairs and make sure you don't fall back down on your head."

"Twinkies. Kate bought me some."

"Yup. On the kitchen counter. Pee first. I'll make you some tea."

Tony edged his way through the kitchen to the downstairs bath using walls and counters to steady himself, and Gibbs busied himself with the tea pot, keeping an ear out for any crashes and bangs. Setting the filled pot on the stove, he was helping himself to a package of Twinkies when he heard the front door quietly open. Fornell. Neither Abby nor Kate were that quiet coming into the man's house.

"Tobias. In the kitchen." he called out, and the Fibbie made his way in without worrying now to be quiet. Gibbs spied the bags hanging on the man's arms and went to help him. "Jeeze, Tobias, you planning on spendin' the weekend?"

"Figured you'd have a crowd later. Also figured you hadn't done any shopping recently."

Gibbs smiled up at the man, glad to have him in his corner. Out in public, they did their duty of cross agency sniping, but off duty, Fornell was as formidable a friend as he was foe to criminals. And he liked Gibbs' team, which was even more important to the lead agent.

"Nope. Back to back cases, then this goatrope. Appreciate the thought. Want a Twinkie?"

"Hey...those are my Twinkies, Boss." Tony whined coming in behind Fornell.

"Only ate one package, Tony, still a dozen of them in there. Sit, I'll open a couple for you."

"Holy shit, DiNutso, look at you! You look like a..a...like I dunno, like you ran into the side of brick building!"

"I did." Tony mumbled, taking an open package from his boss. "His name was Damon Werth. Then I ran into Officer Watson."

Gibbs poured a cup of tea for Tony and set it down in front of him, then poured a cup of less industrial strength coffee for Fornell and the two older men sat down with the younger one.

"Wanna know what I found out about Watson or am I not supposed to talk about it in front of the children?"

Both Gibbs and Tony harrumphed, but Fornell caught the the touch of a smile on DiNozzo's lips and smirked at Gibbs.

"Go ahead, there's no sense trying to keep anything from him anyways, he'll sniff it all out eventually."

Fornell grinned and looked at the young man wolfing down Twinkies, knowing there was pretty much nothing Tony couldn't uncover given enough time and resources.

"Watson's been on the force a little over four years. No write-ups, no marks in his file, nothing saying in print he's ever gotten out of line with a suspect. Talked to some of his superiors, they say they never had to verbally reprimand him, although he has gotten a little aggressive at sporting events and once got tossed out of a venue. This most recent incident seems to have just been a momentary lapse in judgment pertaining to treatment of a Federal agent. That being said, I hope ya beat the snot out of him, Jethro."

Tony stiffened in his chair, his Twinkie-chewing frozen mid-bite.

"Boss, you're not gonna – you can't just go after him and -"

"Tobias, what the _hell?"_ Gibbs growled, all but kicking the man under the table. "No, Tony, I'm not 'gonna'! I'm going to have a talk with him, no hitting, no yelling, not even a head slap. Agent to officer, just to make sure he understands what the consequences could be for him if he has another 'momentary lapse in judgment', as Tobias so nicely called it."

Tony nodded and went back to eating his Twinkie, satisfied by way of a still muddled brain and Gibbs' reassuring voice that his boss meant exactly what he said. And Gibbs had, but Fornell was reading between the lines and gave knowing wink to the older agent.

"Alright, then, I'll leave you to it, here's his work address and supervisor's name, there's cereal and fresh milk and fruit in there when you're done sucking up those Twinkes. I've gotta get to work, we're in the middle of a wire-tapping, can't be gone from the place too long. Good luck, Jethro, let me know how it all washes out, DiNutso, hope next time I see you you don't look like death on a cracker."

"Thanks, Tobias, how much I owe you for the groceries?"

"Ahh, I dunno, we can figure it out later, and as for the other stuff, well, now you owe _me _one, Jethro."

Gibbs nodded and smiled as Fornell drained his coffee cup and headed out, squeezing Tony's shoulder on the way.

"Behave, bambino, don't make Jethro give you a head slap on top of that broken nose, yer brains might fly out." and with that he was out the door into the breaking day, leaving Gibbs drinking his coffee while Tony demolished another pack of Twinkes.

"Need something other than Twinkeis, Boss. Fornell bring any bananas or oranges?"

Gibbs dragged the bag off the shelf and set it in front of them to rifle through it, and tossed a navel orange to his second.

"Gonna go talk to Watson when Kate gets here. You stay here with her, I won't be very long."

"Fine. Just don't hurt 'im, Boss, please. He's not worth wreaking your life over."

"Not gonna do any such thing, Tony. Quit worrying about it, I've dealt with guys like him before."

"Okay." Tony replied glumly. "Don't leave me too long with Kate, she'll have me in bed and reading Little Men to me and stuffing me with vitamin water and tofu wraps."

"Be gone a few hours total, that's all. Won't take me very long to get my point across, I can guarantee that. Abby'll be showing up, too, so brace yourself. You're going to be in for a fun morning."

_**Okay, so I unintentionally lied about this being the last chapter of this story arc. Gibbs' 'discussion' with Watson is longer than I wanted to add on to this chapter, plus we need a little fluffy Kate and Abby taking care of Tony time.**_

_**TBC...**_


	19. Chapter 19

As soon as Gibbs was confident that Kate had Tony occupied and thinking of how glad he would be when she went home, he slipped out the door and headed to the address Fornell had supplied him with. Kate and Tony exchanged thoughtful looks, and Kate read Tony's mind for a change.

"He's not going to do anything illegal or stupid, Tony, you _know _he wouldn't risk his job and leave us at the mercy of another team lead."

"I know, Katie, I just think it's a lot of fuss over nothing. Yeah, it was a bad decision on Watson's part, but we've all made them in the heat of the moment."

"Not ones that hurt someone else. And you know if he gets away with doing this to you he'll try it on someone else, and that someone else might be someone like Fornell, who'll turn on him and blow his stupid head off."

"Yeah, I suppose you're right."

"You _know _I am, Tony. Eat your yogurt, it's good for you."

While Tony balked and Kate squawked over the benefits of yogurt, Gibbs hotfooted it to Officer Ethan Watson's precinct, confident that he would be given some time with the young patrolman to enlighten him after speaking with Watson's supervisor. Sure enough, the Captain on duty was agreeable to Gibbs' request, and mortified at what his subordinate had done to a fellow officer and federal agent. Watson had just arrived for his shift, and hadn't gotten out on the highway yet when he was called to the Captain's office and introduced to the NCIS lead agent.

Gibbs watched the young man's face pale several shades, and if he'd been as soft-hearted as his Senior Field Agent, would have felt a bit sorry for the guy, but he wasn't and he didn't. He'd already gotten his signals crossed with Damon Werth, he wasn't going down that path again.

"Officer Watson, I've had a very enlightening conversation with Special Agent Gibbs here, and have decided to grant his request and give him permission to impart a couple hours of sensitivity training that seems to be lacking from your agenda. He's promised me he'll have you back safe and sound in time for morning break, so off you go, and don't give the man a hard time, I'd hate to hear back form him that you were an uncooperative student."

Watson looked from Gibbs' fiery face to his Captain's determined one, and almost blurted out that not only would he not give this scary man a hard time, he had no intention of not doing whatever the scary man wanted him to do. No questions asked. He had been both expecting and dreading this moment ever since he had found out the guy he'd just thrown to the ground and cuffed, then brutally kneed in the ribs was not just any federal agent, but Jethro Gibbs' agent. He'd not been on the force that long before he had learned that Gibbs was one of the feds you either learned to deal with or stay totally away from, with the latter being the preference for most anyone he'd talked to.

Now he was not only going to spend a couple hours time with the man, but the man also looked beyond pissed at him, like 'willing to spend some time in jail over it' pissed at him. There was not even a thought of not going with the federal agent. He pulled himself together as best he could and nodded wordlessly, knowing that anything that came out of his mouth now would be blather.

"C'mon, Officer Watson, haven't got all morning, got an agent waiting to make sure his boss doesn't do anything stupid on his behalf. He won't behave till he knows for sure."

Back at Gibbs' house, both Kate and Abby had joined forces against Tony, at least that's how Tony was viewing it. Cripe, he had just woke up from what his body perceived to be a trip through an old ringer washer, couldn't they back off just a tad? Kate was still trying to force feed him yogurt, and Abby was trying to find a good way to put crushed ice on his eyes and nose to help the swelling and where the hell was Gibbs again in his time of need? Off seeing to yet another wrong-headed, muscle bound guy.

The activity around him was making him dizzy and nauseous, and he just wanted to go lie back down on his couch downstairs and sulk about what Gibbs was doing to Officer Watson.

"Tony, you have to eat something other than Twinkies and an orange, you know what those pills do to your system!"

"Exactly, Kate, which means I can't manage anything more right now. Just make me some herb tea and let me go watch some movies, okay?"

And so it went for the next two hours between the three of them, while Officer Watson was also learning what it was really like to be tortured. Rounding a curve at a speed that not even he would take on an emergency call, Watson clung to the side of his seat with one hand, and the dashboard with the other while Gibbs' Challenger fish-tailed back onto the side road. It had been a while since its owner had had a chance to take it out and open it up, clean some of the junk out of the engine, and now was the perfect opportunity. Watson thought back to what a well-meaning co-worker had told him about Gibbs, and he'd laughed it off, never thinking he'd experience it first hand. At the most he thought he would get a verbal dressing down from the fierce agent, scary enough, but not particularly life-threatening. This, _this _was life-threatening.

"And whatever you do, _don't _get in a car with him if he says he's gonna take you for coffee or something. I've heard he's a maniac behind the wheel and that his Senior Field Agent _still _gets car sick sometimes."

_Well_, Watson had thought. _I'm a cop, I've had plenty of defensive driving training, and been on plenty of high-speed chases. His Senior Field Agent must be some kind of a whimp, hell, he was crying for his partner to help him when I threw him down on the ground! _He was later embarrassed to learn that the agent he had so easily pummeled had not only just puked his guts out, but been attacked by a crazed two hundred pound Marine. Now he didn't have the opportunity to even think of being embarrassed for calling Gibbs' SFA a whimp as the man took another curve on what Watson would swear on his aunt's grave was on the right rear wheel only.

So far the NCIS agent had said nothing to him, behaving as if Watson were not even sitting in the front seat of his car with him swearing wordless oaths and praying to St. Jude. They were on a straight away now, with no more curves in Watson's foreseeable future, and he was about to breathe a long sigh of relief when the car hit the crest of a hill and sailed through the air some feet to slam back onto the road, the top of his head glancing against the roof of the car. Through a strangled gasp, he heard the man next to him let out a throaty laugh.

"Tony loves that hill, makes me come this way every time we go so he can pretend he's on a ride at the midway! Knows enough to brace himself for it, though. Sorry." he added, though not in the least bit, and Watson knew full well it was intentional. Gibbs didn't have to look over at his riding companion to know he was barely holding on to his breakfast. The green cast to his face with a light sheen of perspiration told him all he needed to know.

"You know Tony, Tony DiNozzo, the federal agent you threw onto his face yesterday afternoon, knowing he was already injured. _My _federal agent." Gibbs' voice grew hard, and deadly serious as he slowed down and turned into a drive with a sign that told Watson they were at a shooting range. Well, at this point, it could be a blessing to have a swift end, he mused to himself.

"My federal agent who tossed himself in front of an enraged Marine stoked to the gills on steroids, so that I wouldn't get thrown into my other agent, Kate Todd, and land on her." he continued as they drove the short distance to the large outdoor shooting range. "You've probably never heard of her, either. Used to work for the President. Of the United States." he emphasized, cutting off the car's engine and looking ahead out the window.

"Secret Service. Do you know how smart, and tough a gal has to be to win a spot on that team? Thing is, she's not tough when it comes to Tony, at least not to him, especially when he gets hurt. But let her get her hands on the person that hurt him, and I don't even wanna think about what would happen. She lets me have it when I get sideways and start picking on him cause I'm frustrated and tired, and I'm her boss. Nope, doesn't bare thinking about. Come on, got something I wanna show you."

Watson was frozen in place, too afraid to move, yet too afraid not to. So far Gibbs had not laid a finger on him, which he had almost expected from the man when he'd seen the thunderous look on the NCIS team lead's face upon first meeting him. Gibbs had barely even _looked _at him, for which Watson had been immensely relieved. Now he was victim to his fight or flight response. This was _so _much more than going to a diner for a cup of coffee to talk things out and make nice.

"You get out of the car now or I drag you out bodily, your choice." Gibbs offered levelly, though his voice was cold and brittle.

Watson all but jumped out and to his feet, and regarded the man with wide, wild eyes. He couldn't just take him out and shoot him, his Captain knew who he was with. He waited, and watched while Gibbs went to the back of the Challenger and popped the trunk open, pulling out what Watson knew was a serious piece of weaponry.

"What kind of scores ya got going going for your target shooting?" Gibbs asked casually, as if he hadn't just threatened the man with bodily harm.

"Uhh..I ...I'm pretty good, s-sir..er, Agent Gibbs.."

"Pretty good, hunh? Well, if you're happy with 'pretty good', then that's all you can ask for, right?

Cause, I know I would feel really safe going out in the field with my _own _agents being 'pretty good'. So what if I come back with a couple a' holes in my head, there're lots of agents waiting to take my place."

Watson gulped. Maybe he wouldn't offer up any more information in any form unless he absolutely had to. He dumbly followed Gibbs to the range shed, stood behind the man while he checked them in, and tried to ignore the smirks from the crew who had a pretty good idea of what was going on. He was handed his obligatory ear and eye protection, and watched in morbid fascination as Gibbs reverently removed his rifle from its carrying case and set up to do some practice rounds.

When the paper targets came back, all from varying distances and shooting conditions, Watson tried to stare past them, understanding exactly what the NCIS agent was trying to get across to him. Each and every target had perfect groupings in the middle of the paper outline heads. Gibbs tossed them in the trash, carefully packed up his rifle, and headed towards the car.

"Don't for one second think I can't do the same thing with a Sig Sauer. Or any other weapon. You get back to the precinct, you tell everyone there and any other cop you ever see who Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo belongs to. If I need to, I'll get Kate to go a few rounds with you in the gym, she's just itching to get her hands on you. But I bet you're 'pretty good' at hand to hand combat, too, hunh?"

Gibbs climbed into the Challenger and revved the engine, while Watson waited outside, most likely contemplating having one of his friends or co-workers come pick him up.

"Suit yourself. Not gonna wait longer than ten more seconds for you to make up your mind."

Watson gave in and got into the car, ready to beg the man not to drive back to the precinct the same way they had gotten there, but even if he'd really wanted to, nothing would come out of his mouth at the moment. Gibbs headed back down the drive to the road at a reasonable pace, his ire seemed to be cooled now that he had gotten his point across to the patrol officer.

"Your boss says you don't have any prior record of brutality or even verbal abuse. I want to think this was a case of having an 'off day' and letting your instincts get in the way of your good judgment. Tony doesn't want to press charges, didn't even want me reprimanding you about it. He was a cop for six years before I grabbed him for my team, he understands danger and reflexes out in the field. I was a Marine for a lot longer than that. So I understand too. But if I _ever _find out that you pulled this crap on another federal agent, I will make your life a living hell. You got a beef with feds, you keep it to yourself. Hell, most of the fed agencies can't stand each _other, _but we try to keep it to verbal abuse, no beating each other up. And nobody touches my team. Neither one of them would ever put themselves in a position where any of you would need to, what happened yesterday was _your _misunderstanding, not _theirs._ You could have waited for Agent Todd to show you her I.D and looked for her badge before

taking things as far as you did. You threaten one, the other's gonna come after you, that's how they are, and how they should be. You don't have that in your partner, you'd better find yourself a new one."

Watson nodded dumbly, hoping against hope that this was the end of it, and he could get back to the precinct and report in sick for the remainder of the day where he would go home and collapse and reconsider transferring to another precinct, in another city, like San Diego, or Anchorage. Or maybe he would change careers altogether. His uncle kept bugging him to join the family dry cleaning business.

"Okay, then." Gibbs announced, happy with the man's non-verbal response. "Time to drop you off and get back to kid, he's probably about ready to run away from home by now with Kate and Abby babysitting him. Oh, and you should know about Abby, too. Also very protective of Tony. She's our forensic genius. When she tells you she can kill you and not leave any evidence, well, you figure out the rest. She's also very good at tracking down and _keeping _track of anyone she wants, so beware. She'll have her eye on you for quite a while until she thinks you're not a candidate."

Watson nodded again, ruing the moment he had ever behaved so rashly when he saw Agent Todd's weapon clipped to her waist. Never again. If he had to, he'd sit in the car and wait for his partner to run the tags. Still, he had to admit that he was kind of envious of this DiNozzo kid, having so many team members so willing to watch his six to this extent, and a bit awed at the lengths the guy's boss went to get his point across without lifting a finger to someone who had hurt him. It was far worse punishment than he had imagined, but he now realized it was far better than what it could have been.

_**To be continued...**_


	20. Chapter 20

_**A/N Thanks to whomever pointed out that I spelled Lynyrd Skynyrd incorrectly, that was embarrassing! I've listened to them for ummm, well, let's just say, lots of years, but never needed to spell their name! Thanks to all who have reviewed, favorited, followed, and read this. Unbeta'd, all errors are moi's. Also, while this is the last chapter of this particular story arc, there will be more chapters in general for Refuge. Depends on what I decided to filch next.**_

While Gibbs was making his way home and stopping to pick up a few more things at the store, Officer Ethan Watson was in the men's room at his precinct trying desperately to gather his wits and present some sort of casual front regarding his shake down by the NCIS Special lead Agent. There was no way he was going to be able to lie to his friends and co-workers that the last two hours had been a friendly lecture followed by a stern warning, he just couldn't force the color back into his face to make any pretense of the fact that they certainly hadn't gone out for coffee.

Maybe it would be a good thing to let them all know what happened, he would be doing them all a favor by warning them. Or maybe not. It didn't matter now, he had been seen coming back into the building by security, and the word had probably gotten around already. Well, nothing could be as bad as the last hundred minutes spent with that seriously deranged Gibbs. There was a reason Watson wasn't fond of feds, and he was even less fond of them now, but not in a million years, or at least while Gibbs was still around, would Watson express his opinion of them either physically or verbally. Humiliation was one thing – a bullet in the middle of the forehead was another, and something told the officer Gibbs just might be able to get away with it. He headed for the break room for a good stiff cup of coffee before he signed out for the day.

Back at Gibbs' place, Tony was wishing for a good stiff cup of McCallen 18, and was trying to remember where his boss had stashed the last bottle he'd brought home. If Gibbs didn't come rescue him soon, he was sure the girls were going to start painting his nails and giving him a cucumber facial.

Their chatter had turned from Tony's sudden hatred of yogurt to redecorating his room to a giving him a different hair style. He liked his hair the way it was, and even Gibbs didn't seem to mind his slightly non-reg shaggy do.

"You leave his hair alone." came a growly voice behind them as Gibbs himself strode through the door and held out bags for one of the gals to take, and Kate and Abby exchanged knowing smirks.

Gibbs had never pressured Tony to cut his unruly hair, it had never interfered with his work and wasn't non-regulation length, and he ignored or chastised any of his cronies who fussed about it. Tony himself often wondered why Gibbs didn't hassle him about the shaggy style, but wasn't going to ruin things by mentioning it to the man. Both Abby and Kate knew exactly why Gibbs didn't fuss about it, and it was for the same reason they themselves secretly adored it. It made Tony look years younger, especially when it was mussed and poking out after sleeping at his desk.

"Hey, Boss!" Tony looked up a little too eagerly from his plate of forced-feeding, knowing he would be rescued from the two mother hens.

"Why aren't you sleeping, DiNozzo, Ducky said you should at least be lying down now for a while."

"Don't blame me, Boss, I've been trying to get down there since you left, they were determined to make me eat breakfast before I went down there!"

"You made him eat all that?" Gibbs asked disbelievingly, thinking they both should have known better not to feed Tony so much solid food not twenty-four hours since a major concussion.

"Gibbs, he threw up everything he ate roadside yesterday," Kate protested. "A bottle or two of water isn't-"

"I've got it covered, Mother Todd." Gibbs snapped back tartly as he pulled a milkshake maker out of a cupboard and a carton of ice cream from one of the bag , and Tony bit back a laugh as he watched Kate pink up with embarrassment. "God, you two are like a couple of little girls with a Christmas doll, it's a wonder you haven't got him dressed up and in a high chair." Now Abby colored along with Kate, and their unwilling victim couldn't help the snort that escaped him as Gibbs scooped ice cream into the machine and poured in some chocolate syrup and a bit of milk, then searched for a glass to pour it into.

"So did you get Officer Watson back in one piece, Gibbs?" Kate queried, hoping to change the subject from her boss's assertions. Although they _had _talked about finding some foundation that would hide Tony's black eyes.

"Officer Watson got the message loud and clear, and he is still in one piece. Just needed a little sensitivity training is all." Gibbs slapped the button for the milk shake maker and they waited for the noise to stop before talking. He dumped the thick chocolaty shake into a tall glass and plopped it in front of Tony, who joyously started to suck it down. Kate harrumphed, unhappy that she hadn't thought of that for her partner. "You two go home, I've got it covered here." he ordered. "I'll call ya if we need anything."

Kate frowned, but Abby bounced over to her surrogate brother and wrapped arms around his shoulders from behind, kissing him on the cheek.

"We'll be back, Tony Boy, you behave, do what the Bossman says." she chirped, as if her orders held more water than she thought they did. Tony mumbled something to himself about the pot calling the kettle black, which only Gibbs heard and turned up a wry smile to in response. Kate on the other hand flicked the back of her partner's head and departed with a "Later, Anthony.", to which Tony flinched but smiled. He knew it was done in the most loving of ways; she just had a harder time showing her affection for him than bubbly Abby.

When the girls had cleared out, Gibbs relaxed at the table with a cup of coffee and some danish that Fornell had brought while Tony downed his shake.

"Thanks, Boss. I was starting to feel like a science experiment for a while there." Tony muttered.

"They mean well, DiNozzo." Gibbs admonished gently.

"I know, Boss, it's just, they get going and feed off of each other's energy, and you don't know what it's like to be ganged up on by them!"

"Ohh, I know all too well, Tony." his boss admitted, thinking back to the times he had been what the two women considered too rough on his senior field agent, and they'd let him know about it in no uncertain terms. He had made a promise to himself when he'd snagged Tony from Baltimore that there would be no special treatment or coddling of any kind when it came to the care and feeding of the wayward detective, but Abby had schooled him otherwise, and then Kate had come along and reinforced the idea that DiNozzo needed a little TLC, and pretty soon a little had turned into a lot from the two new mother hens, and Gibbs had done his best to rein them in when they got carried away.

He was not much better about it sometimes, especially when Tony ran afoul of a suspect during field work and got injured. Stan Burley had never been such a handful, working steadily and methodically and, well, boringly, really. He had a sense of humor, but was churlish with it around Gibbs, never wanting to rock the boat and upset the highly-strung lead agent. Tony had managed to loosen some of Gibbs' strings, most notably his protective paternal strings, and while he'd fought it at first, he'd eventually given in and accepted the fact that DiNozzo was going to be one of his in a way none of his other agents had been. He was always ashamed to think back on the nasty way he had treated Tony when he first started realizing how fond he was growing of the goofy kid. Gibbs had since apologized in his own backhanded way, and the young agent had seemed to take it all in stride, which bothered his boss all the more for it.

Changing what was a touchy subject for them both, Gibbs cleaned up the uneaten food on the table and inquired as to what Tony wanted to do for the rest of the day, although he had a pretty good idea without asking.

"Just wanna hang out on my couch, Boss; listen to you work. You can tell me what you did to Officer Watson so I don't have to keep wondering and worrying."

"Never laid a hand _on _'im, DiNozzo, other than a friendly slap on the back when I brought him home to his Captain. Never even raised my voice to him." Gibbs gave Tony a penetrating look to get his second's attention. "But he got my message. Nobody messes with my family and doesn't get schooled on the consequences. I know he thought he was doing his job, but Kate said he didn't get out of line 'til he found out you two were Federal agents. They can trash talk us all they want behind our backs, but I won't stand for them getting physically abusive." Gibbs stopped and tipped two fingers under Tony's chin, making sure the young man's eyes met his. "Don't like seeing you hurt, Tony. Seems to happen to ya too much lately."

"Sorry, Boss." Tony murmured, his eyes dropping to the table top.

"Hey!" Gibbs scolded gently, tapping Tony under the chin again. "Wasn't asking for an apology or blaming you, just stating a fact. You don't ever stop giving a hundred and ten percent for whatever you're doing, especially if you're defending your partner. Kate's tough, but she's got a couple blind spots, just like you. Just like we _all _do. You did good yesterday, I wouldn't have asked anything different of you, just wish it would've been me taking the hit from Corporal Werth."

Tony's face lost a shade of color at the thought, and Gibbs gave him a crooked, appreciative smile.

"I know, I would've landed on Kate and probably broken half the bones in her body. Just wish it had been me in front of you."

"So what _did _you do to Officer Watson, Boss?" Tony diverted, getting up and rinsing his milk shake glass out and upending it in the drainer, then heading to the basement.

Gibbs knew he was being detoured off the subject of martyrdom for his team, and gave up on the subject, knowing it would only cause his second more harm than good to keep rehashing the incident.

He followed Tony to the basement door, and gave him an affectionate squeeze on the shoulder.

"Just took him for a little ride out to the country and got in some practice time at the range."

"You take him in the Challenger? Back roads? Over that hill on McCoy Road?"

"Yuhp!"

"Sweeet. Hey Boss, you ever heard that song by AC/DC 'Dirty Deeds, Done Dirt Cheap'? Kinda reminds me of you...'TNT. Oooo, neckties. Contracts. HIGH VOLTAGE!'..Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap, dirty deeds, done dirt cheap..." he crooned, as they disappeared into the depths of the much loved work space.


End file.
